Scorching Illusion
by bimmok123
Summary: Naruto befriends the fox at a very early age, learns a few skills and helps his friends every time he can. NarutoXKurenai pairing. Strong and smart Naruto along with a kekkaei Genkai. Possible future of adding more people and creating harem, all depends on how i feel. First fanfic ever so plz no hating.
1. Chapter 1

Hey! This is my first fanfic, so I apologize if it's bad. Please review or PM me and tell me how it is. I will say this, I'm not sure if it will be a harem or just a solo pairing. I'll let you all try to make that call. Also this first chapter might be moving a little fast cause I want to get it past their D rank missions. I'm gong to try to follow the cannon story line as much as possible not cause I don't want to make up a lot of event but because it's a good story line and why should I use it?

Well hope you enjoy

_**Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Naruto**_

***Random Street in Konoha

"Please let me get home, please..." Naruto whispered to himself and he ran jumping from shadow to shadow. The little 5 year old boy, looking around nervously, his blue eyes darting left and right. His sun kissed blonde hair dirty, covered in dirt that seemed to just have coated him like his face and clothes.

All Naruto wanted to do was get home and hide and wait for this day to be over. He hated the day cause everything seemed to get worse for him on his birthday. The villagers always came at him with more hate on the 10th of October and he normally ended up in the hospital afterwards. He didn't understand why the villagers hated him all he knew was that they did and they wanted to kill him for what ever it was the little orphan did.

Naruto was almost home, he was just a few blocks away from the little apartment complex that his 'jiji', aka the Hokage, had gotten for him, when he bumped into someone. "Ouch... Sorry sir." Naruto said jumping up and giving a quick bow.

"Oh that alrigh... HEY IT'S THE DEMON!" the man yelled out trying to grab Naruto as he quickly ran and tried to scramble away.

Running as fast as his little legs would carry him, he was soon forced to run in the opposite direction from his apartment as a mob started to gather and give chase while they screamed at him calling him "demon" and saying that they would just end him now that they found him.

As Naruto ran they started throwing things at him, at first it was just garbage but soon he felt something cold and hard hit him in the shoulder and the back of his right thigh and sink into his skin. Stumbling he fell and skidded across the ground only for the mob to see this and run at him in a frenzy and start kicking him. He quickly curled up into a ball to lessen the damage.

"Move out of the way, I'll finish this nice and quick." someone said with venom dripping from every word. Naruto looked at the man as he approached and could see a smirk on his face. Pulling a kunai out he walked up to Naruto and quietly whispered, "This is for my mother and father you fucking demon!" before he started to stab Naruto in the stomach.

"WHAT IS GOING ON HERE!" a loud voice boomed over the crowd.

"Oh, Hokage-sama, we're sorry if we disturbed you, we were just taking care of something." someone in the crowd said. The Hokage quickly moved forward to see what was going on and seeing the ninja standing over the little boy.

Naruto was like a son to the old man, he would always visit and even try to help where he could. Seeing the boy in a growing pool of his own blood he stopped for a second taking in the scene.

The same person who had tried to apologize for disturbing him walked over to the Hokage and quickly began to tell him that they were purging the evil of the village so everyone would be safe. The man seemed quite sure of himself as he was a wealthy business owner and figured he knew he was in the right.

The Hokage quickly snapped his fingers and all around the crowd were ANBU. "Detain everyone there!" the old man said unleashing killer intent so concentrated and so powerful that even the ANBU were nervous.

"What are you doing!" people began to yell out as the Hokage quickly picked up his surrogate grandson and started walking swiftly to the hospital.

*****Mindscape*****

_'Am I dead?'_ Naruto thought to himself, _'It's so cold.'_

Naruto opened his eye's and stared up into the darkness. _'Where am I?'_ He continued to question even as he sat up and found himself in water. Naruto looked around to figure out the answer to his question when he heard a woman sobbing.

Naruto quickly jumped up and tried to strain his ears to figure out where is was coming from.

After he ran around for a few minutes trying to figure out where the woman was he found himself in a room with giant bars reaching up into the darkness. It looked like a door with a tag that that 'seal' written in kanji on it.

Seeing a small light in the distance he quickly ran toward it as the sobs of the woman grew louder and louder until he found her sitting in the water with her knees drawn up to her chin, her face buried and hidden by her glowing crimson hair.

Naruto had never been one to leave someone crying, even when he was afraid of the villagers, he would always try to help the person out. Normally they got over their crying and sadness and it just turned to anger toward him but he felt that was better then being sad.

"What's wrong?" Naruto question the woman. He quickly walked over to her and sat in front of her hoping for her to talk to him.

As the woman was crying he could hear her say "I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..." though if she said anything else it was lost in the sobs that seem to wrack her slender form.

"What are you sorry about? Have you done something wrong and got in trouble?" the little boy asked as he scooted closer to her, making the water ripple around them.

The woman looked up at him with tears just running down her face. _'Wow... she's pretty...' _Naruto said as he looked into red eyes that had their pupils in slits. The woman despite all the crying giggled a little but then even more tears kept flowing down her face. Looking the boy in the face "I'm so sorry for what keeps happening to you. It's all my fault, if I hadn't gotten caught in a genjutsu back then none of this would be happening," and with that she buried her face in her knees once again as the sobbing seemed to increase.

Naruto needless to say was rather confused, he had heard the word before when he was around jiji but he didn't really understand what it meant, but whatever it was it had upset this woman a lot. "Well... It doesn't matter now if it happened in the past. Jiji always said, 'What happened yesterday is a thing of the past, while the consequences and look for the brighter tomorrow!' He's old and smart, do I'd listen to him." Naruto said with a smile on his face. "Oh, I'm Uzumaki Naruto by the way."

The woman looked him in the eyes, tears still streaming down her face, "Why don't you hate me?!" She screamed at him.

Naruto jumped back ready to run, it was his normal go to response whenever someone yelled at him. He stopped when she didn't move at him, and he felt even more confused now then before. "Why would I be mad at you? You haven't hurt me have you?" He asked.

"I'm the Kyubi no Kitsune, I'm not reason for everyone hating you!" She screeched at him before becoming over come by sobs again.

Now Naruto may not have been the brightest of kids, but his jiji did teach him how to read and write and some basic history. The Kyubi was the demon that attacked on the day of his birth and went on a rampage. Naruto looked at the woman who was crying, _'That can't be right, the Kyubi was supposed to be a giant fox with 9 tails that wanted nothing more then to destroy the leaf. How could this woman who's __crying__ be a demon?'_

"Are you sure? I mean for starters the fox is supposed to be huge with 9 tails, you don't even have ears like a fox on you, so how could you be a demon?" Naruto was rather confused by all of this and he wanted answers. "Here," he sat down right in front of here again so he had her attention, "you tell me what your talking about and I'll just listen okay?"

The woman was shocked by how calm he seemed. She decided to just tell him and figured she could get him to be mad at her faster then maybe she could get it over faster.

*** 20 minutes later (Still in the mindscape) ***

"And that's how I got here." Kyubi said finishing her story about what had happened, how she was release from her previous container which had been his mother, that she was caught by a genjutsu that from someone who possessed the Sharingan, that his father the fourth Hokage fought her and finally that she was sealed in him to keep the village safe. She even replayed the last minutes of their death for him.

Naruto sat there and absorbed all of this, at times tears streamed from his eyes and others his rage seemed to grow almost out of control, but he never once interrupted her or asked her questions and stopped her. He wanted to know so he sat there in silence.

As the minutes passed by she couldn't help but wonder what he was thinking and she grew more and more afraid of his reaction. She had sat in her cage for 5 years watching what the villagers beat and torment him. It wasn't her fault that she couldn't do anything, the seal that Minato used a seal that not even she could scratch, not to mention that she was still trying to recover some of her chakra after half of it had been stripped from her during her attack.

"Naruto-san?" She asked in a small voice.

Naruto looked up at her and stared at her for a second before giving her a smile. "Okay then since your going to be staying with me I've got a couple of questions for you, is that okay?"

Kyubi was floored, she wasn't sure if it was a trick, or something else completely different. All she did was nod, "S-sure I'll answer anything you'd like."

"Okay first question Kyu-chan, do you want to destroy Konoha?" Naruto asked with a serious face.

"Ugh do you know how many time's your mother asked that question?! NO I don't want to destroy the leaf. It's you people who attack us bijuu because of our power. The previous generations just wanted to control our power so we would fight and you could dominate each other." Kyubi said with disgust in her voice.

"Yeah, humans in general seems to be rather horrible, though there are probably some people who aren't that bad. Anyway second question, can you train me?"

Kyubi just had a blank face on before she started laughing. "HAHAHA, your asking me to train you?" She doubled over laughing. " Why don't you just demand my power from me? And what could you possibly want to do with training?"

Naruto looked her in the face while she calmed down, though she still giggled a little. "Well it's your power so I have no right to ask you for it, all I want is to train so I can protect myself and those I care about. My dad was the fourth Hokage, I can only guess as to why he became the Hokage, but from what you showed me it was to protect people and I want to be just like him." Naruto stated firmly.

Kyubi was surprised by this, the only other person she had come into contact with that didn't demand anything of her was his mother; And all she did was say that she could help out whenever she wanted to so long as she behaved and didn't go on a rampage. Smiling at the memories she had she looked up into the boys bright azure eyes and smiled, "Fine, I'll train you. You'll have to tell me what you want to learn, and you'll have to do a lot more physical conditioning but it sounds like you want to be a shinobi, and for someone who has treated me with the respect that you have, I'll train you."

Naruto launched himself at her, knocking her off balance and landing in the water, as tears streamed down his face and over the corners of his smile. "Thank you! Thank you!" he said over and over again.

"Okay, okay that's enough crying. Now if I'm going to train you I need to know how you want to fight, and then while you sleep I'll come up with something okay?" Kyubi said still holding the child. She had never felt this before, to hold someone so young to herself she felt the instinct to protect him wash over her, and just let it happen.

"Okay, umm but what do you mean how I fight?" Naruto asked looking up at her while his face was in her bosom.

"I mean what range would you like to fight at, and how would you like to fight. You fight at close range, medium range, or long range. You can fight with power, speed, tricks. Those are the things I mean." She said looking down on him with an almost motherly look in her eyes.

"Umm... I'd rather fight at long range and be really fast, but I know ninja have to be tricky too so..." Naruto thought out loud as he tried to figure out how he wanted to fight.

"That's okay, I think I can work along those lines. Now what I need you to do is open up your senses to me so I can help you and communicate with you so you don't have to keep coming to the mindscape, which won't help you train all that much."

"How do I do that?" Naruto asked again confused.

"Don't worry, but thinking about it you have already allowed me to use and enhance your senses. We'll be able to talk, and all you have to do is think about what you want to say, and at any time you can cut me off if you want privacy."

"Umm, I don't really understand it but okay!" Naruto shouted giving her a foxy grin.

"Okay, okay, you need to go get some sleep and we'll talk more in the morning. I've already healed your so you should be released from the hospital soon."

Naruto nodded and just closed his eyes.

*** Next morning outside the Mindscape***

Sarutobi Hiruzen sat behind his desk in his office as he was facing off against his mortal enemy... Paper work. It was right now winning as the pages were stacked rather high and no matter how fast he tried to go, they always seemed to be getting bigger. He could never understand how the previous Hokage was capable of getting through it so fast.

As he was looking over a report a knock sounded at the door. "Come in." Was all Hiruzen said.

The door opened to reveal a female ANBU wearing a cat mask. "Ah Neko-san what is it?" the old man asked as she entered.

"I'm here to report that Uzumaki-san is awake and asked that you come see him whenever your free." the female said after she took a knee in front of him.

Quickly getting up, he walked just past her and said over his shoulder "Well? Are you coming along or not?" With that both left his office in a swirl of leaves, only to find themselves in front of a hospital room. The door was shut and another ANBU was standing guard over the door, this one wearing a weasel mask.

Hiruzen nodded to the ANBU and opened the door to see Naruto sitting up looking bored. As he walked in the little boy quickly took notice, "Hey jiji!"

Giving a little chuckle to the boy who was smiling up with a grin that looked like it almost taken over his face. "Well Naruto, how are you feeling?" Hiruzen said sitting down in a chair next to the bed.

"I'm really good, I feel better then ever!" The boy said almost bouncing out of the hospital bed. "Umm I have a few questions I'd like to ask you if you don't mind jiji."

The elderly man was quite taken back by the quick change in the boys attitude. "Okay, what is it you'd like to know?"

"Well first I'd like to ask if I could start training to become a shinobi. Then if I can I'd like to ask you to let everyone that hurt me yesterday go." Naruto said, the grin no longer on his face and his eyes held a certain seriousness to them.

Hiruzen and the female ANBU were taken back for a quick second. "Well now I have a couple of questions for you, why do you want to be a shinobi? And what would make you think that I would let those people go?"

Naruto stared into the his eyes and without flinching, "Well I want to be a shinobi so I can protect everyone I care about, and if I train hard enough then I'll hopefully be strong enough to protect myself soon then this won't happen anymore."

Sarutobi looked into the young mans eyes and said, "That answers the first question, but you failed to answer the second one."

"Well jiji... I know why they attacked me, and I understand their frustration and fear for it..." And with that the little boy told the old man everything that the fox had told him and showed him, having completely forgotten about the female ANBU in the room, he even went into details that wouldn't have been known unless he had actually seen it. Which in a way he had after viewing it from the fox's perspective.

The Hokage was stunned to say the least, not only had he figured out about the fox, but he also found out about his parents and how the fox said she would train him. When Naruto explained that the fox was actually a woman his jaw hit the floor, and he never ended up picking it up tell the end when he just sat there for ten minutes trying to figure out what it was he was going to do.

Naruto watched his surrogate grandfather thinking, and he wondered if he had done the right thing by telling him. _**'Of course you did the right thing, besides you wouldn't be able to train without him allowing it so you were gong to have to tell him sooner or later anyway.'**_

Naruto sighed, _'Yeah I know I was going to have to tell him sooner or later, but I'm just wondering if he'll believe me or not and on top of that I don't know how he's going to react'_

"Naruto take off your shirt for me if you would please, I need to make sure the seal is still intact for the safety of the village."

Quickly pulling off shirt he turned at hearing a gasp from the female ANBU. The elderly man growled at the sight of the 5year old boy who had faint scars all over his almost sickly thin body.

"What?" Naruto asked looking at his jiji's scowl.

"This is something that will be dealt with later," the Hokage said. He moved over to the young boy and channeled chakra into his palm to show the seal. After an inspection of the seal he declared it to be safe. "Now Naruto would you mind telling me what you eat?"

"Well not a lot, I normally eat that Ichiraku, every couple of days. The people at the market said I would be fine cause I was young, besides they charge me too much so I can't normally buy anything." After he finished saying that it was deathly quiet, then everyone seem to growl at once, the loudest being Kyubi.

All three of them, the Hokage, the ANBU, and Kyubi said at one, "How dare they!"

The Hokage quickly asked for what stores he normally goes to and Naruto quickly gave up the names, hoping to not be in the elderly man's fury.

"Alright Naruto you can start training but because of this accident I'm going to have to assign you a little protection is that alright?"

Naruto nodded, "Who is it going to be?"

The Hokage quickly chuckled, "Don't you worry about who, but we will make sure that this never happens again, alright?"

Naruto quickly grinned his foxy grin at the old man while nodding. "Hey jiji can I go home now since I'm all better?"

"No Naruto, you may have healed the injury, but you still lost a lot of blood. I know you heal quickly but your body can't replace new blood that quickly. I'll come get you tomorrow and then we'll go get ready for your training okay." Hiruzen said with a smile on his face.

"Okay jiji!" Naruto responded with an impossibly huge smile.

***Time skip 7 years later***

Naruto was walking through his door as he was gasping for breath while sweat was dripping off his body. Kyubi had come through when she said she would train him. She started helping him with physical training and chakra control. He found out that because he had so much chakra that it was going to difficult to control so she figured might as well start him on that. The past month she had upped his chakra control and started to teach him the basics of Ninjutsu and Genjutsu. He learned Kage Bushin no Jutsu from Kyubi and she had him use them do chakra control and him do all of the physical training because they clones could transfer memories but not physical training.

As he walked into his small apartment he began to strip off his clothes and take a shower. As the hot water rushed down his body taking the sweat and dirt with it, he began to wonder if the fox was trying to train him or kill him.

_**'Oh come on, it's not that bad, besides we need to make sure your in top physical condition and bring up your stamina.'**_

_'You keep saying that Kura-sensei, but I already have good stamina.'_

_**'Yes, well this is also helping with your speed, since you chose long-range fighting. When you capture someone in your genjutsu you need to move quickly so you can make the kill and move to assist the other people around you.'**_

Naruto couldn't deny that's what he had to do, he just felt like complaining like any normal kid would. On the third month Kyubi had show him how his mother had fought by using what is known as pure chakra. It was something that only his clan had achieved with great success. It would allow him to create what are known as chakra chains, something that his mother was very good at. It was hard and he hadn't gotten it right yet but he was still going to work at it. His mother was feared for it and being one of the last of the Uzumaki's he figured he would keep the tradition going.

Naruto often asked to see how his father had fought, but Kyubi couldn't show a whole lot, cause she was sealed inside his mother and not his father. When he found that out he asked if she could show him times that they were together, and she agreed to let him see them. It was how he finished every night before he fell asleep.

Along with the Genjutsu and Pure Chakra training, Kyubi had discovered a few things for his Ninjutsu. He had a Kekkei Genkai known as Scorch Release. It combined both of his nature affinities Fire and Wind. Naruto wasn't able to use it yet, Kyubi was teaching him the element control and manipulation first for fire and wind.

Naruto and Kyubi had slowly grown closer together over the last 7 years and he would happily talk with her about just about anything. He learned that her name was actually Kurama, though she hated it. She kept saying that it wasn't cute. Though she loved to joke with him, he ended finding out that she was quiet the prankster and he was slowly becoming that way as well. He had taken to pranking, much to the annoyance of the rest of the village, and he loved it. Whenever he was caught by the Hokage, which was rare, he just said that it was for the purpose of training. Which wasn't a complete lie, he was using it as stealth training and pranking the ANBU forces was just lots of fun mainly cause they always gave chase.

_**'Hey, make sure you go to bed early, remember you have the graduation test tomorrow.'**_

Naruto groaned, _'Stupid test, I always hold back, since this is the last test can I go all out please!'_ he begged. Kurama didn't want him showing off any of this skilled and just get average grades cause she worried about what the villages response would be if he started scoring higher then anyone else. Kurama had starting teaching him early on and he knew a lot more then what they taught in the academy.

He knew a so much that he would stop to help anyone who asked. Other students would actually come up to him during class and ask for his help, which he normally smiled and said sure. He still pranked everyone, but if someone wanted his help he helped in a heart beat. Even the stubborn Uchiha Sasuke would ask every now and then when he was stuck on something though he still acted like ass. He had a small group of friends and he wasn't going to push to get more.

_**'Yes you can go all out on the test tomorrow, no since in worrying about what the village will do cause you'll be a shinobi and no one would be crazy enough to try and take you on then.'**_ Kurama said with a smile and snickering. _**'No go to bed young man.'**_

Naruto let out another sigh and quickly got into bed and fell asleep.

*** At the academy during the Final Graduation Test***

"Alright Uzumaki Naruto, come up." Iruka said.

Iruka was probably the only teachers that actually cared about Naruto and treat him like any other student. Most of the other teachers still saw him as the fox and mistreated him a lot of the time, but every time they either gave him a bad grade and he ended up getting hurt he just shrugged it off and went about his business.

Naruto walked into the room and stood before Iruka and another teacher named Mizuki. He didn't really like Mizuki, he just gave him the creeps and every time he talked it was like he was lying to you.

"Alright Naruto, I want to you before a Henge, Bushin, and Kawarimi." Iruka said to him.

Naruto nodded and proceeded to Henge into the Hokage, created 4 Kage Bushin cause he couldn't do normal Bushin. Something to do with him having too much chakra, and then he did a Kawarimi with Iruka himself.

Iruka nodded, "Good job Naruto, here your Hitai-ate. Congratulations, you pass." Handing the headband to Naruto with a smile. Naruto took it with a huge cheeky grin.

Just before he walked out he turned to Iruka, "Hey sensei, meet me at Ichiraku's I'm buying!" Naruto said jumping up and down in excitement as he exited the door.

*** Next day team placement***

"Alright team 7 will be Uchiha Sasuke... Haruno Sakura..." A scream of excitement by said girl was release and everyone around grabbed their ears to shut it out, " and Uzumaki Naruto, your jonin-sensei will be Hatake Kakashi

After everyone was called Naruto went and sat at the table next to his team to be closer to them. He ended up sitting next to Shikamaru Nara. He was a rather lazy guy but was a complete genius. Naruto loved hanging out at his place when Kurama let him rest from his training every now and again. Just behind them were the rest of team 10 Ino Yamanaka and Choji Akimichi. Ino was kind of Sakura in the fact that she seemed like a complete fan-girl. Choji was fun to be with cause he was always kind and normally he was around Shikamaru.

"So you coming over again tonight Naruto?" Shikamaru said without raising his head from the table.

"Haha sure, I'll come over. Hey what was the last count?"

"163 for me and 108 for you." Shikamaru said.

"Hey what are you two talking about?" Ino asked leaning over the table.

"Shogi" both boys said at the same time.

At that time their Jonin-sensei named Asuma Sarutobi, the son of the Hokage, walked in and called them all to the stairs.

Team 7 were the last ones left in the room so Naruto quickly put an eraser in the door and hopped up and table and got into a meditative state. He was focusing on tempering his chakra so he could mold it into chakra chains. The ones he could do right now were too weak to be used against anyone, so he had to try to make the connection stronger.

They waited like, Sakura swooning over Sasuke and Naruto meditating. Naruto finally got up cause his legs were stiff when a jonin walked through the door and the eraser hit him square on the head almost bouncing off his gravity defying silver hair.

All three of the fresh genin look at him and wondered if he was really a jonin. "Well, my first impression of you three... your a bunch of idiots." he said "Now meet me on the roof in 5 minutes." And with that Kakashi left in a swirl of leaves.

*** 5 minutes later on the roof***

"Alright why don't you introduce your one at a time." Kakashi said.

"What do you mean sensei?" Sakura asked.

_**'How did she be the number female in the class'**_ Kurama said, with a tint of annoyance in her voice, _**'I swear fan-girls make all kunoichi look bad'**_

Naruto chuckled a little at that thought but didn't comment. "Well say your likes, dislikes, hobbies and dreams." Kakashi said sounding bored out of his skull.

Naruto spoke up, "Why don't you go first sensei and show us how it's done."

"Alright, My name is Kakashi Hatake, things I like and things I don't like... don't really feel like telling you. Hobbies... Well I have lots of hobbies. As for dreams... Well I never really thought about it."

_'Great, all we got was his name.'_ They all thought together.

"Okay we'll start left to right, you first." Pointing to Sakura.

"Oh well I'm Sakura Haruno, things I like," she glances at Sasuke "my hobby is," glances at Sasuke is with a little eep, "my dream for the future is..." again glances at Sasuke only for her to squeal.

"And your dislikes?" Kakashi asked.

"Naruto and Ino-pig!" She yelled. Kakashi looked at Naruto in time to see him roll his eyes and then shrug his shoulders.

"Okay next..."

"My name, is Sasuke Uchiha, I don't really like or dislike anything. I don't have a dream, but an ambition. I'm going to restore my clan and kill a certain someone." Sasuke said with his hands in front of his face.

"Umm, okay, next..."

"Hi my name is Uzumaki Naruto, I like ramen, training, and playing Shogi with Shikamaru. I dislike the 3 minutes you have to wait for the ramen when you cook it and people who don't take their training seriously. My hobbies are training and trying different types of ramen and comparing them. My dream is to become the greatest Hokage, believe it!"

_'Okay, so I've got a fan-girl, a rather depressive emo kid, and a rather normalish kid. This is going to be interesting.'_ Kakashi thought. "Well alright, meet at training ground 7 at 7am, we're going to have a survival test."

"Wait test? Didn't if we're taking more tests then what was the graduation exam?" Sakura asked.

"Oh that? That was to pick candidates to be selected for Genin status. This test is to weed out the weaker members. This test unlike your exam has a 66.6% fail rate so over 2/3's of your friends from school will be sent back home. Oh and you might want to skip breakfast as well, you'll only end up throwing it up." And with that Kakashi was gone in a swirl of leaves again.

***Training Ground 7, 7am***

Naruto was in the sitting by a tree when the other two showed up. They walked over to him and sat down next him with their bags plopped on the ground. Naruto was sipping some tea he had brought with him.

Because of how early it was the temperature was still a little chilly so Naruto turned to his team mates and asked if they would like some warm tea. Sakura said she would and took the cup he offered her and handed her a sandwich as well. "Baka why did you bring food?" Sakura asked.

"Simple, the body needs food to get energy, and it's not a breakfast but a snack so its alright. On top of that it's not so throwing it up shouldn't be an issue. Well that and their great with the tea." Naruto said taking a bit out of one of the sandwiches.

Sakura went to argue but her stomach growled leaving her to blush in embarrassment and quickly devour the sandwich and tea.

Sasuke had fallen asleep quickly once he sat down so Naruto saved a sandwich for him just encase he want/needed it.

*** 3 hours later***

Naruto had been meditating while Sakura had taken a nap using his old orange jacket as a pillow. He had gotten knew clothes the were more for being stealthy. He had black ANBU styled pants with multiple pockets, a form fitting black sleeveless shirt, a modified vest with the Uzumaki orange swirl on it, and black sandals. His headband was on his forehead holding his bangs back.

Naruto opened his eyes to see their sensei walking toward them, so he moved over to Sakura and lightly shook her awake. She groaned but opened her eyes. Seeing Naruto right when she woke up she quickly decked him thinking he was doing something naughty. "Pervert!" Sakura screamed as her fist made contact with Naruto's face throwing him back a few feet.

Naruto didn't see it coming so he was on the ground twitching ever so slightly. After she assessed the situation with a slightly clearer head she quickly said she was sorry. "Na, it's all good," Naruto said holding his fractured nose while blood streamed out slowly. He popped it back into it's rightful place and felt Kurama started healing it quickly.

Kakashi saw this and when he saw Naruto get up he saw him smiling and waving her off saying he should have been more careful.

Sakura then saw Kakashi, "Sensei YOUR LATE!" she screeched.

"Oh sorry about that, I got lost on the road of life." Kakashi said.

Sasuke had woken up after Sakura punched Naruto. He stood up and walked over to stand with his team. Naruto quickly gave him the sandwich and tea and said to eat it. Sasuke like Sakura was going to argue but quickly devoured it instead, and washed it down with the tea.

Kakashi was actually impressed for a second. He walked over to 3 wooden training pools and took out a timer and 2 bells, the bells he tied to his vest and timer he placed it on the ground. "Alright you three, your test is simple you just have to get these bells from me that's all."

"But sensei there are only 2 bells." Sakura pointed out.

"Exactly the one who doesn't get a bell will be tied to one of those posts while he or she watches the others eat their lunch and will then be sent back to the academy." Kakashi explained.

All three of them had grave expressions on and began to stare at the bells as if trying to will them off his vest.

Kakashi pressed down the button on top of the timer, "Begin!" and all three of the genin dove into hiding.

Naruto quickly crawled with as much stealth as he could and found Sakura and Sasuke and they pulled back ever so slightly so formulate a plan. "Okay lets think about this, 2 bells and 3 of us. I can't help but think there's a twist to this." Naruto said in a hushed tone.

"I hate to do this baka, but I agree. There's never been a team of just two genin unless it's a master/apprentice grouping. Konoha uses 4 man squads at all times, it's text-book." Sakura added, slowly thinking the way Naruto was.

"Which means all of us have to be able to pass, but odds are we just have to pass a certain qualification to do it." Naruto said finishing the thought. Putting a hand on his chin he starting to think.

_**'Hun don't strain yourself trying to figure out the reason behind it is, just work together to bring get the bells. Remember he's a jonin and you all are genin. Also don't use any of your Shakuton jutsu. Keep that a secret.'**_

_'Yes sensei,'_

Naruto then spoke to the group again, "It won't matter what the qualification is, let's just work together. He maybe a jonin but it's three to one, we can at least get the bells. Okay here's the plan I've come up with..."

Kakashi stood in the trees and saw the group huddled together, both Sakura and Sasuke were looking at Naruto while he held his hand over this mouth and seemed to be telling them a plan. Smiling, Kakashi went back to the clearing and decided to be surprised with what they would come up with. In his book, they've already won the test. Now it was just a matter of letting it all go down.

As time rolled over it was utterly quiet in the clearing where Kakashi stood reading his book, giggling every now and then.

With only 20min left on the cloak, Kakashi was wondering if they had just run away. Giving a deep sigh he turned to see team 8 walking by. Kurenai Yuhi turned to look at Kakashi when it all happened. Soon feathers seemed to be falling everywhere and the 3 genin, Hinata Hyuga Shino Aburame and Kiba Inuzuka with his ninken Akamaru, all fell to the ground passed out.

Naruto cursed under this breath for not being careful and hitting them with his jutsu. He watched Kakashi and Kurenai make a ram hand sign and dispel the jutsu. Grabbing a kunai and launching it at his sensei to signal the attack.

Sasuke quickly ran out of the tree line, with Sakura behind him, and quickly ran through hand signs and yelled "**Katon Gokakyu no Jutsu**!" and release a rather large fireball at the jonin. Kakashi quickly dodged it sliding off to the side still reading his book.

Jumping out of the tree line Naruto quickly ran through practiced hand signs and whispered "**Magen: Jigoku no mon**" Kakashi now seeing Naruto and then his vision fades and the rest of his senses slowly started to go numb. Naruto then yelled while running at him, "Sakura now!"

Sakura quickly threw herself at their sensei knocking him over but also cutting the string that kept the bells tied to his jacket. Naruto putting chakra into his feet and legs quickly sped out and grabbed the bells and Sakura before retreating back to Sasuke who had launched several shuriken at the jonin as a preventive measure.

When they struck, the body of their sensei was replaced with that of a log. As the trio looked at each other they all cheered to each other that they were able to get the bells away from their sensei.

Kurenai stood there watching in amazement not only at their teamwork but at the little blonde genin who's genjutsu was the key to the whole strategy and how powerful it had been. She just looked at him dumbfounded before Kakashi reappeared in front of all them in a quick swirl of leaves.

Kakashi congratulated them on passing the test when Naruto quickly ran over to the downed team and removed his genjutsu from each of them. As all of team 8 rose to their feet, he quickly apologized for them getting caught in it.

"I didn't mean to make it that strong to knock you guys out, I was just looking to see how quickly Kakashi-sensei would react. I'm sorry." Naruto said while scratching the back of his head with a grin.

"So your the one who used that genjutsu?" Kurenai asked walking up behind him.

"Yeah, I'm sorry did I get you with it as well Yuhi-san?" Asked the boy.

"Actually you did and to be honest I was surprised. Not many people choose to use genjutsu anymore. In fact I'm rather curious that a genin like you could pull off something like that." Kurenai said with her arms folded just under her chest.

Naruto just blushed slightly scratching the back of his head mumbling nonsense about being complimented, Kakashi walked up and join the conversation, "I'm more surprised by the other genjutsu. I've never seen one like it, what was it?" he asked rather curious to how a genin who by all the test scores was average through and through.

"Oh you mean my **Magen: Jigoku no mon**? I created it a while ago, though it doesn't always work right off the bat, I have to be in direct line of sight for it to have it's full effect where you loose all your senses and are surround back darkness only to be confronted by a burning gate." Naruto explained.

"Would you mind showing me it some time? I'd love learn it." Kurenai said. Naruto just looked into her crimson eyes and nodded while giving her one of his foxy grins.

Kakashi turned to his team and said, "Alright your all free to, meet back here tomorrow at 8am to start your training." And with that the jonin started walking away.

"Sure, I'll talk about it over a bowl of ramen later. Bye!" Naruto said as he ran off towards his apartment. _'God she was beautiful...' _Naruto thought when he was almost out of sight.

_**'Oh? You like her?'**_ Kurama asked, though watching his thoughts and how pervy they were getting she knew he did.

_'I-I-I don't know what your talking about Kura-sensei...' _But he knew he did, and he knew that she wouldn't let him live it down.


	2. Chapter 2

**Okay so I first wanted to say thank you for all of the comments and reviews. After some thoughts over the story line that I want to go with It will have to turn into a harem story. Which for the next couple chapter there are two spots open in the harem, I've already got the first 3 which will be Kurenai, Hinata, and Yugao. The other two I'm leaving up to you guys as the readers too see what you all would like. I would need to know how you who you would like cause they may impact the story line and I'd rather have it all planned out before hand instead of having to change it up in the middle of the story and everyone getting all confused. Also I'm having trouble deciding if there will be a Wave arc or not. I want Naruto to meet up with Zabuza and Haku but that doesn't mean I need a Wave arc. Again let me know what you all think. When you vote you need to let me know why you chose that way, also for harem votes "Cause it would be hot" is not a valid answer.**

**Anyway if you need to ask any question on where the story line is going, or if you'd like me to consider then just send me a message and I'll do everything I can to respond. Again thank you and keep reviewing!**

***Hokage's Office ***

As the afternoon sky shone brightly over Konoha, Hiruzen sat at his desk facing off against his greatest enemy, an enemy that always eludes defeat, is relentless, and seems to never to give up. The unforgiving paperwork.

The elderly man gave sigh as he finished reviewing a mission and looked over the village that he swore to protect, like all those who came before him. As he looked through the windows of his office he saw kids running around playing, he could see a few streets that were bustling with business and he couldn't help but feel great pride in the fact that his village was prosperous and safe.

Giving another deep sigh, he turned to picked up the next piece of paper that required his attention. After seeing what the report was about, he was forced to read and re-read it again to make sure that the report was accurate. After reading it for a third time, Sarutobi snapped his finger and an ANBU appeared kneeling before his desk.

"Please retrieve Uzumaki Naruto, and bring him here immediately. I don't care what he is doing; he must be present for this." The Hokage said.

Nodding the ANBU left in a puff of smoke to find Naruto. Quickly re-reading the document a fourth time, Sarutobi walked out of his office with the document and headed to his destination to wait for Naruto.

*** Unknown Location ***

"This is Sakura, I'm in position. No sigh of target."

"This is Sasuke, I have target in sight now headed toward your position. Stupid thing is so predictable."

"Naruto here, ready in case it decides to run…"

"Target is on the move, headed south. Request permission to engage and subdue."

"This is Sakura, I see the target. Can confirm it is the correct target, I see the ribbon from here."

"Team Leader, to all of Team 7, engage now and subdue."

Hearing the order to engage the two genin quickly rushed the targets location only for it to be evade and run down an alleyway. As it tried to jump over a fence Naruto hidden from view on the rooftops quickly ran through a set of hand signs. "**Genjutsu Sagari-wa** (Genjutsu: Falling Feathers)" He whispers out. The target quickly fell asleep and fell off the fence into the open arms of Sakura. After quickly confirming the identity of the cat from the description they were given, they began to quickly make their way back toward the Hokage's Office where the client was waiting.

"Good job you three, okay after this you can all go home. Tomorrow we'll meet at Training Ground 7…" Kakashi began to say before an ANBU appeared before them.

"Uzumaki-san, Hokage-sama has requested your presence immediately." The ANBU said.

Naruto looked at Kakashi, then quickly turned to the cat and released his genjutsu so it would be awake. The cat woke with a start and began to scratch Sakura. Sakura was surprised by this and let the cat go before Sasuke grabbed it by the scruff and held it.

"Ugh Naruto! You baka, look what that stupid cat did!" Sakura screeched at him.

"Sorry Sakura-chan, but he couldn't stay in it forever." And with that Naruto quickly grabbed the ANBU and was shunshined way to where the Hokage was waiting.

'_Hmm, I wonder what that was about.' _Kakashi questioned, but just kept moving to turn the cat over so he could leave and go home.

*** Underground Courtroom***

As the Hokage walked into the room, he was greeted with the sights of the Clan Heads who all sat in a high-backed chairs that sat at the top of the stands. After receiving the acknowledgement that of his arrival, he took his seat at the podium that over looked the courtroom.

As he settled into his seat he watched as the convicts walked into the room, being escorted by an ANBU, and were standing against the far wall in the shadows. Hiruzen looked over the 5 convicted ninja and sighed as the memory of their crimes slowly began to flood over him. Moving his hat so no one could see his scowl as he was supposed to remain impartial and be able to continue without emotional complications.

After a few minutes of silence, the door opened behind him and Naruto stepped out into the courtroom with his own ANBU escort and taken to the podium to sit next to the Hokage.

"Hey jiji, what did you need me for?" Naruto asked, quiet confused as to why he was here.

Hearing how familiar the little boy was with the Hokage, a few of the Clan Heads chuckled. Naruto heard a few of them chuckle but it was so faint he couldn't tell if it was real or a figment of his imagination. Not giving it another thought, he sat down next to his jiji and waited tell he was given an answer. His ANBU escort quickly bowed to the Hokage and disappeared into the shadows.

"Naruto, you are here, because by law, the victim must be here as judgment is passed on them after having served their primary punishment. Right now we are going to review the crime and decide whether or not they need to be punished again, or if we feel they have been rehabilitated then they go on probation. Do you understand?" Hiruzen looked at Naruto only to see a nod as his usual smile was gone with no trace at all.

Standing up he waved the first criminal forward and he was taken into the light by his ANBU escort who then left him in the center of the room and melded back into the shadows. "Kisame Abumi, do you understand what you have done?"

"Hai," the man said, "I remember exactly what I did, and to be honest I don't see what I had done wrong. The demon needed to be purged from this village, and seeing as you wouldn't..."

That was all the man said before the Hokage snapped his fingers and the ANBU who had escorted him and his ninjato piecing his chest, ending his life quickly. The Hokage stood up, "Under the Law that I myself passed, you've mentioned the Kyubi, the only sentence for this is death. Next please." Hiruzen quickly picked up the file and began to scan it's contents.

This continued for the next 3 convicts, all of which were sentenced to probation for 5 years, in which time if their record stayed clean and completed a stated amount of missions, they could once again be eligible to be promoted and could once again join the normal shinobi forces after they were through with an interrogation from Ibiki to make sure that they would still be loyal to Konoha.

Naruto sat quiet next to the elderly man, trying to keep from reliving much of that night, and it was getting harder and harder with each man that stepped forward until the damn finally broke as the last man stepped forward.

"Jiroubou Akasun, step forward." Sarutobi said. As he turned to grab the last file on this man he glanced at Naruto and stopped dead in his tracks.

Naruto had his knees up against his chest with his arms wrapped around them as tears kept streaming from his eyes. Hiruzen could his eyes that once were bright blue, filled with happiness, now as dark stormy blue filled with fear. He knew this would have been an issue for him, but it was this last man that had brought up the fact that he had to be here even though it was never enforced before. He probably figured that he would be able to do as much damage as he could to the little boy as he could before he was sentenced again.

Hiruzen looked back at the old jonin and saw the smirk on the man as he was looking at Naruto. Standing up so he could quickly get this over with and get Naruto as far from here as possible, "Jiroubou Akasun, do you understand the crimes that you have committed?"

"I know what I did, and I've yet to see the crime after all these years." Akasun said with a smirk on his face. He wasn't stupid like the first man, he wasn't going to mention the fox and be killed.

"Your crimes are as followed: Several counts of assault, which I see has gone up even after your incarceration. Attempted murder on one Uzumaki Naruto, and I also see you attempted to escape and flee the crime scene even after you were ordered by the Hokage to stay where you were. Now do you understand?"

The man just looked upon the Hokage, then looked down and closed his eyes. Quickly taking a breath and summoning as much courage as he could he quickly rushed the Hokage as a final act of desperation and defiance.

Naruto saw the man move, almost in slow motion. He saw out of the corner of his eye as ANBU quickly tried to move into action to protect their leader and the clan heads. Moving without thinking, Naruto threw himself in front of a stunned Hiruzen while pulling out a kunai.

The two impacted into each other and were bowled over from the speed of the jonin. Naruto was trapped under the man as he felt something warm and wet drip onto his black shirt and soak it's way through. As quick as the body was on him, it was thrown off by the Hokage and slammed into the wall.

No one moved as they saw the kunai piercing the man's chest. Looking down to the protruding object, he gave a small smile then in a small voice few could hear, "Haha... Told... You... He... Was a... Monster." and with that the man collapsed onto the object forcing it even further into his body.

Hiruzen quickly looked at Naruto and saw the little boy covered in blood. Giving him a quick once over he found the boy physically uninjured. However the boy was shaking rather horribly, as he wrapped himself in the fetal position and his eyes seemed to glass over.

Hiruzen quickly picked the boy up and ordered his ANBU to clean this mess up and called Inoichi to quickly come with him to his office, and both left in a quick swirl of leaves.

*** Hokage's Office ***

The door to the office was thrown open as Hiruzen carried an almost catatonic Naruto and quickly placed him on the couch. Not more then 2 steps behind his Hokage, Yamanaka Inoichi stood ready for what ever orders he was given.

"Inoichi-san, I need you to quickly put him to sleep then please try to erase the last few hours from his memories." The Hokage said as he stepped away from the boy who had thrown himself in front of the elderly man to defend him.

Nodding, Inoichi quickly ran through a few hand signs and placed his hands on the little boy's head. Naruto's eyes slowly shut but his shaking continued until he lost total consciousness, then he just laid there unmoving except the rising and falling of his chest.

Again Inoichi ran through hand signs, closed his eyes and placed his hands once again on Naruto's head and began his journey into the little boys mind.

***Naruto's Mindscape***

Inoichi opened his eyes and looked around. He found himself on a pathway but he couldn't see the side or the ceiling, only the lightened path that lay before his feet. Having no other choice then to follow it, or stumble around in the dark, he walked with his senses on high alert and ready to remove him from this young mans mind.

As the continued to move slowly through the mindscape he heard a soft crying sound off in the distance. Picking up the pace quickly, Inoichi come to a room of unfathomable proportions. Still on the path that was illuminated for him, he saw something in the air, that seemed to hang there suspended above the end of the path.

Looking closely he realized that it was Naruto, floating in the fetal position as visible tears dropped from his form, as his back was turned to Inoichi. Moving quickly over to the young teen, he didn't realize that he had passed by huge bars as he quickly ran up the path.

As the man neared Naruto the darkness filled with old memories as if being played back on a TV. Each memory from his past seemed to scream at him calling him various names, "MURDER!" "DEMON!" "DEMON BRAT!" and the like.

This quickly forced Inoichi to stop and for once realize how horrible this child's life had been, and inwardly cursed himself for not stopping it and helping him. As he began to walk again to the small child and giant rumble sounded and a small quake could be felt by the clan head.

Turning to his left his face paled as he looked upon the form of a giant fox, it's tails thrashing around in anger. The presence he felt made him almost wet himself as he slowly stepped back, with fear in his eyes.

Quickly remembering how he got here, he made a hand sign, snapped his eyes shut and stopped the flow of his chakra. He opened his eyes expecting to be outside with the Hokage by him but to his horror he was peering into the red slitted eyes of the fox as it's lips were pulled back and it's fangs bared at him.

As he turned to run away a tail slammed in front of him stopping his advances, he quickly whirled around and a giant hand slammed down on him pinning Inoichi to the ground. **"And where do you think your going!" **The fox sneered at the man.

Feeling a fear he had never felt before Inoichi could do nothing but stare, and hope that he could find away out of this situation to get back to his daughter and wife.

**"I bet you've realized by now that you can no longer leave here. I'm keeping you here with my chakra so we can have a lovely chat about WHAT THE HELL YOU ALLOWED TO HAPPEN TO NARUTO" **Karuma roared, the very force shaking everything, rattling the jonin's teeth. Looking over it didn't seem to have fazed Naruto in the slightest.

"Umm... If you'd like to talk, could you perhaps let me up and then we can have a proper discussion..." Inoichi said, trying to keep the stutter out of his voice. Truth be told he was more scared now then he had ever been in his life. He was hoping that it would show some form of courage and the fox would respect it and hopefully he could then figure away out of this situation.

Huffing out a large breath, which blew the man's ponytail around, she raised her hand off of him before slamming her tails down around them, blocking off any possible escape the man might try. As he picked himself up off the ground the fox looked him in the eye, **"Now that your up, why don't we have a parent-to-parent talk. I still want to know why the hell you didn't secure that courtroom better!"** Karuma asked, still fuming with rage.

"It was secure, we've never had this happen before. No one has ever rushed the Hokage at their own trial, and made it that far. He was supposed to have Chakra Restriction seals on him so he couldn't use chakra to move, and the Gravity seal that was placed on him was so that he could hardly move. You can't blame us for this!" Inoichi argued back. "We have no idea how this happened, maybe one of his seals was faulty or he was just that powerful. Whatever the reason, I'm here to remove the memoires from Naruto so he won't be depressed. I'm under orders from Hokage-sama, and if you knew what happened in the courtroom then you know that he is very worried about Naruto."

The fox stared the man down before heaving a heavy sigh. **"Your mission can never be completed because of me. My chakra has been laced into his memories, and removing any of them will cause him to go mad, and be even more unstable. He's coped so far, and I have faith he will come out of this even stronger. I've done my best to try to comfort him, and I'll keep comforting him until he comes out of this state."** Kurama said with a saddened tone, lifting her tails as she walked over to Naruto and wrapping around him, shielding him with her tails while she was still able to keep a weary eye on the man.

"Why do you care so much for this child? I'm sorry for my rudeness but your interaction with him seems to be a little odd, almost like a parent protec..." Inoichi began, seeing a smile appear on the fox before he was sent away from the mindscape with that final image.

***Hokage's office (1 Hour after entering the mindscape)***

Stumbling back from the shock of being forced from Naruto's mindscape, he stumbled over the small table the was placed in front of the couch and landed on the ground. Looking around Inoichi quickly regained his bearings and stood up ready to address the Hokage.

As Inoichi relayed what happened to the elderly Hokage, Hiruzen looked over at his surrogate grandson with sorrow in his eyes. Asking that the man stay, he quickly summoned Kakashi to his office.

"I'm sure your aware of the situation that happened earlier?" Hiruzen asked the one-eyed jonin who was currently reading a little orange book.

"Hai, I am."

"Then I must ask if you have anything you'd like to add before we attempted to mend the situation for that little genin?"

Looking up from his book he looked at the little genin as he jerked a little and whimpered. "I believe that he should see a councilor. I remember the first time I was forced to kill, and the horrible feeling from it. Minato-sensei was there for me, and gave me very sound advice. The trouble is that the advice would only work during a time of war. Naruto openly defended you against someone, who had once attempted to kill him. I don't see how I can be of any help." The jonin said, again glancing at Naruto.

"Sir, If I may, I believe Naruto should be transferred to Team 8." Inoichi spoke up.

"Care to explain why you want to take one of the genin off my team?" Kakashi said, looking the man in the eyes.

"It's quiet simple really, Kurenai was at one point a councilor. She has the experience to handle a case like this and we don't have to take me off of active duty, which by keeping him on missions will allow him to hopefully move past this quicker." Inoichi said.

The Hokage quickly snapped his fingers and an ANBU appeared behind both jonin. "Summon Yuhi Kurenai here immediately."

The ANBU quickly disappeared in a swirl of leaves to find Kurenai.

Not 15 minutes later the red eye jonin walked through the door only to stop as she eyed the whimpering teen on the couch, then turned to address the Hokage. "You wanted to see me Hokage-sama?"

"Hai, it's been brought to my attention that you worked at a councilor, is this true?"

"Hai, I did for a while but that was years ago. I haven't helped anyone like that in a while." Kurenai said with an eyebrow raised in confusion.

"Have you heard about what happened a few hours ago?" Kurenai nodded, still confused, "Well we have been discussing what to do with young Naruto-kun here, and now after hearing everything I believe that it would be best to place him in your care on Team 8. Do you have any issues with this?" Hiruzen asked from behind his desk.

"While I would love to offer my aid to him, I can't teach 3 genin and help him." Kurenai said, again giving Naruto a quick glance.

Kakashi looked at her as she glanced at the teen, then turning back to the Hokage, "I believe if we switch Naruto with one of her squad so we can keep the teams even, and you can offer counseling to Naruto can keep a better eye on him. On top of all that, when he get's better you can also help train him in his primary jutsu that he uses since it is your specialty." Kakashi stated with an eye smile.

"I guess that would be alright, but who would we transfer to keep everything even?" Kurenai asked, with a small smile now that she could help the small child.

"I believe that if we transfer the Inuzuka to my team, that will even everything out in terms of talent. You never know I might be a better teacher for Inuzuka-san then you cause of his fighting style." Kakashi stated as he turned back to his book.

Looking at the book, Kurenai seemed to fume with anger before gave a sigh and quickly tried to forget it was there. "Well it seems that all of this has been decided. Kurenai, as his new sensei would you please take him home and inform him of the change. You all are dismissed." Hiruzen said with a quick wave of his hand as he turned to battle it out with the feared paper work yet again.

Kurenai turning to Naruto scooped him up into her arms and left, jumping through the open window and moving across the rooftops to save time.

_'Wow, he's a lot heavier then I thought he would be. He must have been doing some serious muscle training to get like this.'_ Kurenai thought as she looked down at the still sleeping form of Naruto.

_'Where am I? Why do I feel like I'm moving?'_ Naruto asked himself with his eyes still closed.

_**'You'll never guess who's caring you kit, haha oh you so need to open your eyes right now. 500yen says you pass out from shock!'**_ Kurama said cackling.

_'Oh hey Kura-sensei, what happened? I remember the courtroom, I remember jiji picking me up and taking me to his office... but after that I don't remember anything.'_ Naruto asked.

_**'Just suffice to say that some things have changed, hopefully for the better. For now just listen and do what they tell you alright? We can talk about what happened later tonight when you rejoin me in the mindscape. Which on that note, we need to make some serious changes here. This is SO depressing, and after 12years I'd like a change of scenery.'**_

_'Sure, whatever you need.' _Naruto said, as he tried to just remain still feeling the rush of wind on him some almost cuddling into something soft on his right side.

Kurenai feeling Naruto relax into caused her to blush a bit, not really knowing what to do. She decided to ignore it and passed it off as him just seeking comfort for the trauma he suffered earlier. She quickly saw his apartment and landed on his little balcony and opened to the door.

She wasn't fully prepared to see his room and was floored for how clean it was. Naruto being only 12 years old, he was amazingly clean, Kurenai almost felt a little jealous remember how clean she thought her apartment was. Looking at his though made her just want to run home and clean it, feeling it was now dirty compared to this apartment.

Trying to ignore the pristine apartment, she walked over and laid Naruto on his bed, and then turned to leave.

"If you'd like you can have something from the fridge before you go."

Kurenai looked over to see Naruto sitting up with his legs thrown over the side of the bed, his face covered in dried tear stains and an almost haunted look in his eyes. He slowly got up from the bed and walked into the bathroom where Kurenai could hear the sink turn on as he began to wash his face.

Kurenai just moved to the couch the sat on the opposite wall from his bed and waited for him to finish cleaning himself up. She looked in front of her and saw a book sitting on the coffee table, "Intermediate Guide to Genjutsu/Tips and strategies for Genjutsu". Smiling she picked it up and began to look through it as a wave of nostalgia came over her.

As she looked through the book with a smile on her face, Naruto had come out of the bathroom with a clean face and moved into the kitchen to make some tea. As the tea quickly brewed he couldn't help but remember the look on the mans face as he called him a monster, and the smile that came with it. Shaking again from the memories, Naruto tried his best to force them away for now and just worry about his unexpected guest.

Grabbing two cups from the cabinet, and quickly put the tea and cups on a small tray and walked them out to see that Kurenai was done looking the book.

"Oh thank you," she said with a smile taking the offered tea, "So your taking this genjutsu seriously I see."

Naruto smiled, though Kurenai could see from his eyes that he wanted to make any expression except a smile. "Hai, I've done all the research I can as a genin, the only material I haven't read about it yet is the stuff they keep for jonin. I find that genjutsu is more of a lost art then anything else, and frankly that saddens me when I find it to be so useful out in the field."

Kurenai honestly surprised by the fact that someone was not only interested in her specialty, which few ever were and those that said they were never truly committed to it; but that he was here talking with her about it as if he had been using it for most of his life. As if it was the most natural thing to him.

"Well I'm a little to surprised, most people tend to stay away from genjutsu normally cause it's not physically demanding as taijutsu, or causes as much damage as ninjutsu." She stated honestly taking a sip of her tea. Rising her eyebrows in surprise for how good it was. "I must say, you keep surprising me again, and again. This tea is rather excellent, and your place is amazingly spotless. For someone of your age I must say it's rather surprising."

Naruto looked at her for a sec then snickered a little, the color never fully coming back to his eyes, _'I guess this must just be reflexive to him.' _Kurenai thought.

"Well when you've lived alone for so long you picked things up, like how to cook for yourself hence the tea. As for how spotless it is... Well I'd rather not have anyone come in here and think less... well more then they already do." Naruto said almost without a care of what he was actually saying.

"Well either way its still a nice surprise. Anyway I figure you'd like to know what is going to happen now, and it's really quiet simple. You're going to be transferred over to my team so I can look after you and help train you more in your genjutsu. As good as Kakashi might be, he is no master of the art." Kurenai said while trying gage his emotions.

Naruto just nodded his head as he sipped away at his tea. Still never really looking her in the eye, "Okay, when and where do I need to report tomorrow then?"

"Report to Training ground 8 at 8am so you can meet the rest of the team. I also need to inform Kiba that your switching teams with him."

"Hai, I'll be there sensei." Naruto said with a slight bow of his head. Kurenai still trying to figure the boy out before her.

"Alright, well have a good night then." Kurenai said as she set her now empty cup on the tray and got up and walked out the balcony door and went home. _'That kid isn't fairing too well. He's bottling it up and that's not good. Wonder how I can get him to open up...'_ Kurenai mussed over as she jump from rooftops to get to her apartment.

Naruto watched Kurenai's fleeing form, still slightly amazed at her beauty, before walking over to his bed and curling up into a ball, in the center of the bed. Tears began to form and fall down his face as he slowly let sleep crawl it's way over him.

*** Next morning at Training Ground 8***

Naruto was sitting off to the side of the clearing with his back to a tree resting. The dark circles under his eyes were clear evidence that he didn't get a good night of sleep, and even though the day had yet to begin, he felt exhausted, and only wanted to climb back into his bed and return to sleep.

Kurenai and the rest of Team 8 had shown up and were talking amongst themselves. Kurenai was wondering where Naruto was, and why he was so late. She hadn't noticed the blonde sitting by the tree yet. Kiba and Shino were talking about what they thought they were going to do, and Hinata just waited for her sensei to say something. She had spotted Naruto earlier when she did a sweep of the area with her Byakugan. She was wondering why he was there, not that she was complaining.

"Where is he?!" Kurenai muttered.

"If y-your referring t-to N-n-naruto-kun then h-he o-over there." Hinata stuttered out pointing over to the tree where the blonde was resting.

"What is he doing here?" Kiba asked, slightly irritated thinking he was there to stop his training.

Kurenai looked where the little girl was pointing, was quickly walked over to the teen. As she approached him she saw the bags under his eyes and realized that he probably didn't get a lot of sleep last night due to the trial. Giving a quick sigh at how hard he might make this she slowly tried to shake him awake.

"Naruto-san, you need to wake up..." Kurenai said as her hand slowly moved to touch him only to pull back as he whimpered softly. She had some knowledge of the boy, she knew him mainly for the pranks he would pull on the ANBU and regular jonin all the time. She also knew that he hadn't lived the easiest life, being alone cause of the fox demon that he held caged inside him.

_'Now that I really think about it, I'm more then surprised he's still even remotely sane. Most people I know would have broken a long time ago.'_ Kurenai thought.

Naruto slowly opened his eyes to see Kurenai's ruby eyes looking at him with concern. He smiled up and slowly got off the ground with her help. Pushing through the exhaustion, he was on his feet walking with Kurenai back to Team 8.

As they approached the 3 other genin, Kurenai saw Kakashi was walking up as well. "Okay, as of right now Naruto is switching over to Team 8, Kiba will be moved over to Team 7 to keep the teams even." Kurenai said.

The Kiba, Shino, and Hinata were shocked for a quick second before Kiba began to shout. "Why am I getting transferred! Why only me?!"

Kakashi walked up to the group and quickly addressed Kiba, "Because of how you fight we believe that you would benefit from working with me. Naruto is more genjutsu based just like Kurenai, so we think he would benefit more from her then from me."

Kiba calmed down a little, but was still slightly red faced only grumbling to himself about things not being fair. Naruto looked at him, yawned, "Just thing, Kakashi-sensei could probably help you figure out some new jutsu that would put you on top in your clan..." Yawning again, covering his mouth with his right hand.

Kiba quickly picked up on that and seemed more eager then before. "Alright, I guess that's alright..." puffing out his chest trying to act as if it wasn't a big deal. Kurenai giggled a little before turning to the others on her team.

"What do you two think of this? I know it's sudden after several months of trying to form a team bond, but I think this switch will be good."

Shino adjusted his glasses, "Sounds fine with me."

Hinata blushed, "I-I-I h-have n-n-no p-p-problem with N-N-Naruto-kun j-joining u-us." _'I'm on the same team as Naruto!' _In Hinata's head she was doing a victory dance, with a smile on her face.

"Alright then, well Kiba, good luck. Alright Team 8, since we have a new team mate it's time to do some teamwork exercises." Kurenai said turning to her new team.

*** 1 months later***

Over the month Naruto had focused so much into trying to integrate himself into Team 8 despite his longing to just stay away from everyone else. He was currently sitting against a tree resting after doing his laps around the field, as he watched Hinata use her taijutsu style against a practice pole.

As Naruto sat there watching, he quickly went over everything that had happened over the month. He was getting closer to his teammates little by little, he was talking with Kurenai more and more, even went so far as to try and ask her out on a date. Even though he did ask her to go to dinner with him, he wasn't sure he got the point across. Naruto was forgetting about the courtroom incident more and more and felt more like his normal self, though he hadn't pulled a single prank since that day.

As all of this was running through his head Naruto watched Hinata as she moved through the katas of her family's taijutsu, and he couldn't help but notice that it didn't suit her. She didn't seem to be comfortable with the style at all.

Kurenai walked over to Naruto were he sat covered in sweat, and she couldn't help but think he was a little hot. Ignoring that pervish thoughts that were running through her mind, she walked over to him and sat next to him watching Hinata train.

"Something on your mind Naruto?" Kurenai asked.

"Just watching Hinata is all... I never noticed before but she doesn't seem too comfortable with the style she's using right now, it almost seems wrong for her to be using it." Naruto stated as if it was almost a fact. "To be honest it doesn't look like she's any good with it."

Kurenai sat there for only a second processing what he said before a tick mark grew appeared on her head. "What did you say?" She asked through gritted teeth at someone disrespecting her student.

"I said it doesn't look like she's any good at the style. She should change it so it feels more natural is all. I mean from what I've observed from her stance it requires power right?" Naruto looked a very confused Kurenai. She didn't really know what he was getting at but she would wait to throttle until after he finished explaining himself. "Well Hinata doesn't seem like she's built for strength, more like she's build for agility and speed. So in a sense that style is wrong for her, she really should change styles. Probably would be too much trouble to do so."

Kurenai was dumbstruck, she hadn't thought of it mainly cause she knew the Hyuga family was so up tight about sticking to tradition, she hadn't thought to ask Hinata herself. "You maybe right, but only Hinata herself can change it, we can't interfere in it at all." Kurenai said, almost helplessly.

Naruto quickly wagged his head in the negative, "That isn't true. As the sensei, you can help advise us on training, even if it goes against what our clan or clans want. Just like if you wanted Shino to learn elemental jutsu, only he can say no. His clan isn't him, and if he wants to against his clans wishes he can so long as you help. Same with Hinata, I say just let her know so she can think on it and maybe do something about it."

Little did either of them know that Hinata and Shino were both able to hear them quiet well. Hinata stopped with sweat dripping off her face, as she walked toward her jonin-sensei and teammate/crush. Standing in front of them, "S-s-sensei could you h-h-help me d-develop a n-new style? N-N-Naruto-kun is right, w-when he s-says I-I'm not c-c-comfortable with it, and I d-d-don't want to h-hold the team b-back." Hinata stuttered out to them, with a blush as Naruto looked at her.

Kurenai didn't waste a second as she quickly jumped up and pulled the girl to help create the new style. Kurenai had been waiting for this, afraid of what would happen if she forced it on the girl cause of her clan's strict rules.

Shino walked up to Naruto as both women walked away, "Quiet astute of you to notice that, even more impressive that you said it. Most people wouldn't say something like that cause of the fear of what the clan would do." Shino said pushing his glasses up.

"Well that's cause people fear the clans reactions, I don't. If it helps them be a better ninja and increases their ability to survive on missions them I'm happy. It's the fear of losing someone that I'd rather not have to face, one of the main reasons why I worked so hard on my genjutsu. While it maybe used mostly in fighting like any other jutsu, unlike the others it allows me to cast it and provide aid to my teammates." Naruto explained.

"I see... Maybe your right and I should learn more than just my clans jutsu." Shino said in his usual emotionless tone, but after spending so much time with Shino, Naruto knew he wasn't happy about being restricted. Putting his hand in his pouch he pulled out a few slips of paper and handed one to Shino who looked at him questioningly.

"This is chakra paper, I got it off of jiji. If you pump chakra into it will tell you what your elemental affinity is, and whether you have more then one. Here I'll show you," Naruto said taking one of the slips of paper and pumping chakra into it. The paper split into 2 pieces where one burned away in a small fire, and the other hung in the air in a small blue fire ball before dissipating.

Shino watched and was actually amazed but couldn't help but wonder what it ment. "The paper splits in half if you have a wind affinity, soaks if you have water, burns if you have fire, crumples if you have lightning, and earth turns to dirt and crumbles away." Naruto quickly gave a small explanation.

Shino now understanding quickly pumped chakra into the piece of paper only for it to get soaked.

"Looks like it's a water affinity for me." Shino said, "Looks like I'll always be at long range."

"How do you figure? If I remember correctly didn't the Nidaime Hokage show that water is a powerful element? I don't see why you would be support if you could be even half as good as him." Naruto quickly said in hopes of bringing his spirit up.

Shino nodded his head, and started to walk off. "Thank you, Naruto-san." Naruto flashed him one of his famous grins.

Quickly pulling out a scroll and tossing it to Shino who caught it with ease and looked at Naruto questioningly, "Elemental Manipulation, it's hard but well worth it in the end." Naruto said to the raised eyebrow of his teammate and then sat back and stared at the clouds. Nodding, Shino opened the scroll and began to read it and walk off.

Kurenai while she was working with Hinata, couldn't help but smile at the turn of events. She was really happy, cause they wanted to learn more then just their clans jutsu, but Shino actually wanted to learn elemental manipulation. Maybe she could get Hinata to do that now, but that would be for another day. _'Well I can already say that Naruto being on the team has changed them quiet a bit, and for the better. I wonder what else he'll do in the future. I'm actually getting rather excited by the possibilities.' _Kurenai thought with an inward smile as she continued to spar with Hinata as she tried to develop her own style.


	3. Chapter 3

**Okay, so first I'd like to thank all those who have given me positive reviews. If I just received one I'd be happy, and for my first time on a fanfic it's really gratifying to get so many.**

**Okay I also wanted to let everyone know that all jutsu that are named in this story will from now be in English, sorry I'm just feeling too lazy to go get it translated.**

**Next the Harem vote is still going on, it won't effect the story for right now, and if you guys don't choice then I have to and I'm very indecisive.**

**Also whether you guys would like to see a wave arc, will impact the harem if you guys want a Fem. Haku. Just saying, would be really hard to bring her in if no wave arc. But that's besides the point. Also, all voting will be over by the time I get the 4th chapter out, which if I can should be done and out quickly. I'm not trying to rush the story but just have most of what all is going to happen in my head, only trouble is putting it into words and typing it up.**

**Well enough of my stupid votes and such onto the fic!**

**I do not own Naruto, that's for better men then myself to own.**

***Training Ground 8***

Naruto let out a huge gasp for air, trying to force as much oxygen into his longs as he could while he threw himself onto his hands and knees so as to give the sweat a place to fall from. After catching a part of his breath, Naruto still breathing heavily looked around at the damage he had caused.

To the untrained eye, it looked as if nothing had happened, but to those who had lived in the ninja arts they could see the slight indentations all around the trees in the low light of the moon. Each indentation looked as if it had been made by chains only there was no splintering of the wood, just deep impressions.

Naruto having recovered enough to even out his breathing, still couldn't stand so he sat back bracing himself on his hands. He felt like he was so close at mastering his control over the chakra chains, but from what Kurama had shown him, he should be able to kill groups of people with this technique but all he could do was make small marks on trees.

_**'Don't worry, you need to master control over them first before anything else. We'll work on power afterwards. Remember, speed will be needed more then anything else. If you can't kill them, then you should be able to bind them at the very least.'**_

_'I know sensei, I know. It's just frustrating is all,' _Naruto sighed inwardly, _'I'll just keep working on it. So what's next?' _Naruto asked.

Kurama heaved a sigh that could have thrown anyone back if she wasn't locked up, _**'Naruto, you don't have enough chakra anymore to work on anything battle related. How about you grab your flute and play me a song.'**_

Naruto was slightly taken back by the request. He hadn't played his flute in a long, in truth he had learned that his dad was able to play as well and Kurama had instructed him in it. The fox had told him that Minato used to play but ended up giving it up once he became Hokage. When Naruto started learning to play he found out that it would calm his nerves and help calm his chakra network as well, so he learned to play many different songs, all turned out to be more like lullabies then anything else.

Shrugging his shoulders and wincing slightly from how sore they were, he finally forced his way to his feet and walked over to his backpack that was sitting not far from him. He picked it up and pulled out a bamboo flute and then leaned back against a tree getting reacquainted to the instrument, completely oblivious to his surroundings.

Not far off three shinobi sat in the shadows watching the child waiting for him to do something as his back was turned to them. "So Kurenai, how is Naruto doing?" Hiruzen asked, looking at the red eyed genjutsu master.

"He's doing a lot better. There almost seems to be a small spark in his eyes nowadays, and thanks to him my other little genin seem to be taking different directions in their training and I think it might actually be better then what their clans want. I can honestly say that he has had nothing but a positive effect on the team."

One of the people who had come with them just stood in the shadows watching the little teen, trying to figure out what it was that he was doing. Kakashi, though not his team leader anymore, still looked after the boy from time to time, he felt that he owed it to his sensei to watch out for his child.

The trio had only just arrived after Naruto had dispelled his chains, so they still had no idea what he was doing in the clearing. "Hokage-sama, what is it that Naruto is doing right now..." Kakashi asked, only to be silenced as a flute could be heard on the wind.

All three of them quickly turned away from each other and stared at the boy, who was now sitting in one of the tallest trees around. As the music seemed to be in harmony with everything around it, blending in with some of the more natural sounds, and not one of the of them could take their eye's off Naruto.

As the music was played, the wind seemed to bring the melody over to the trio as they watched the teen play his instrument masterfully. Kurenai couldn't help but let a small tear drop from her eyes, she had never known that he was capable of something so beautiful.

Without realizing it, she had jumped closer to Naruto, still trying to keep out of his line of sight so he wouldn't sense her. When she was as close as she could be get, she sat with her back to the tree, and just sat watching him with a smile. _'I have to figure out a way to get him to play more often. This is amazing, I've never heard anyone play as well as he does. I swear, he keeps surprising me every time I think I know him. If this keeps up I might end up falling for him.' _Kurenai chuckled inwardly.

When she looked up at Naruto, she looked into his eyes, as he had his locked onto hers. Still the playing continued. _'I wonder when did she get here?' _Naruto asked himself.

_**'Well to be honest, she showed up a while ago. I think she was checking up on you to make sure you were alright. You know not going all suicidal, or homicidal. Now SHH, I wanna listen to you play without the dialog.' **_Kurama said, slowly dancing around in her cage. She loved it when he played his flute. The music he played, while not up beat or anything, was so lovely that it just captivated her right away.

As Naruto was ending his piece, his fingers dancing along the instrument, Naruto couldn't help but look at his sensei who now had her eyes closed and was swaying lightly to his music. He knew that Kurama loved it when he played, she'd been trying to get him to play for her all the time. Naruto just never felt like playing much, he didn't think that his skills with the flute were anything special. He was actually embarrassed about playing in front of other people, which is why he couldn't figure out why he was fine with Kurenai being there.

As Naruto's song came to an end, he closed his eyes focusing on his fingers as he lowered the volume he was playing at until the song faded out. Lowering the flute from his lips he began to feel the embarrassment over come him as he sensed two other presences not far from Kurenai's position. Moving quickly he dropped down to the ground landing in a soft roll and quickly grabbing his backpack and leaving the area at speeds the trio never knew he had.

Kurenai sat there watching him flee away and couldn't help but feel a little sad because he wouldn't play anymore. Getting up slowly she moved over to the two men that had held their positions and noticed the stunned looks on their faces. Quickly saying what the others were thinking, "Well, that was..." was all Kurenai could get out.

Kakashi looked at her and nodded, "Yep, that was umm... different to say the least. Hokage-sama, did you know he knew how to play?"

Hiruzen just shook his head in the negative, he was too awe inspired to use any words for none of them seem to give justice to the situation in his opinion. He had come out only to check on Naruto after feeling his chakra spike rather high, but he wasn't expecting to hear Naruto play something so magnificent. He began to remember how Minato used to play until he became the Hokage. He still played ever now and then for Kushina but other then that he had retired his flute.

"Well, I think it's getting too late, we're due to arrive to get a mission tomorrow at 8am so I need to get some sleep. Goodnight Hokage-sama, Kakashi." With that Kurenai quickly took off to her house, jumping from tree to tree as she replayed the scene that had unfolded in front of her. She didn't even know Naruto was even interested in music let alone be able to play it so affectionately. Kurenai began to wonder what else she didn't know about the little blonde teen.

*** Next morning at 8am at the training field***

Naruto had shown up at his usual 20 minutes early only to see everyone else there. He was a little shocked, normally everyone didn't show up this early so he had time to relax in the rising sun. Shrugging it off, he walked over to his team.

"Okay, we're not training today. You all seem to get the hang of teamwork and I figure we could go get a mission as a change of pace." Kurenai said with a little more excitement then what she normally showed. The three genin looked at her a little skeptical of this new energized Kurenai but they all ended up shrugging it off, and slowly started to walk toward the Hokage's Office.

Kurenai couldn't help but be happy, she had slept so well last night remember Naruto's playing and when she woke, though she didn't get all of the sleep she normally got she felt as if she had and more. Kurenai was unable to get rid of the grin off of her face as she led them to go get their mission.

That brought her back to the present as she began to wonder what mission she should ask for. She knew Hinata was good with her taijutsu, and Shino while he hadn't gotten the hang of water manipulation he still had his clan jutsu to fall on. Naruto she knew would be fine seeing as he normally trained twice as hard as the others, though she wondered why he kept pushing himself. She knew about the fox, but that couldn't be the reason why. Kurenai glanced over her shoulder looking at the genin and couldn't help but wonder what was going through his head. He was a mystery she was would solve no matter what.

While Kurenai was going all of that thinking she had tuned out the three genin behind her as they walked through town.

"So Shino, how's the water training going?" Naruto asked the bug tamer.

"It is proving to be most difficult, I'm have trouble to with the first exercise. I'm sure I'll think of something before too long." Shino replied.

"What are you having trouble with? Or better yet why haven't you tried looking for someone who could help you grasp the concept of it like I did?" Naruto again asked.

"I wasn't aware that you had already done elemental training. Which of your elements have you trained in?" Shino asked again, this time readjusting his glasses while looking at Naruto.

"I asked jiji for training early." Naruto quickly jumped up and pulled two leaves from a tree they had just walked under. "This took me a long time to learn to do so don't worry if your stuck. I had to teach myself how to do it cause no one would teach me, jiji just gave me all the books and scrolls he could." Naruto then held leaf up in two fingers and focused.

The leaf caught fire and burned, Naruto quickly threw it on the ground and stomped it out. Taking the other leave he placed it in both of his palms and focused again only to hear a tearing sound and opening his hands to reveal that the leaf was cut in half.

"Most impressive," Shino said with a slight hint of disappointment in his voice.

"All it takes to do this is time and focus. You'll get it in time, so relax there is no reason to need to learn it right this second. Piece of advise though, you can keep training on it while walking like this. Helps shorten the time sometimes and makes the walk go quicker." Naruto said giving Shino one of his patented smiles placing his hands behind his head.

Hinata had been listening to the conversation between her two teammates happen. When Naruto lifted his arms up and placed his hands behind his head, she noticed how prominent his chest and stomach muscles shows as his already skin tight shirt seems to hug his body even more. Hinata began to blush as too many thoughts of her and him kept running through her head.

She thought of them together under the moon lit sky in the forest, moving over each other in passion, and that's about as far as she got before she flew back from a nose bleed.

"Hinata!" Both teammates ran over to her to make sure she was alright. Kurenai right behind them saw the look on her face and knew almost immediately what had happened. _'Poor Hinata, she couldn't control her train of thought. *giggle* Hmm, interesting thought though Hinata...' _Kurenai thought looking at Naruto as he and Shino slightly fussed over her and helped her back onto her feet.

Hinata still had a blush on her face as she got to feet still a little wobbly, but managed to follow with the help of Naruto and Shino.

Team 8 entered the office and waited to be allowed entry. They were all quickly ushered in as Team 7 was just about to leave. Kakashi looked at Naruto in a new light considering what happened last night. Sasuke after finally seeing Naruto after so long didn't really seemed to care too much, just wondering whether or not if he had gotten stronger. Sakura saw Naruto and couldn't help but wander if he was doing well on his new team.

Sakura may have hated him during the academy cause she always thought he was trying to upstage her Sasuke, but recently she began to notice how Sasuke really acted towards her and she wasn't too happy with it. Looking at Naruto she slowly began to remember all of the things that he did for her and everyone else and couldn't help but smile at him. She began to wonder if she might be too late to become his friend after everything she had done to him.

Naruto smiled at his old team as they passed each other. He noticed Kiba was sporting a really big smile and seemed to have added a little muscle to himself. Sakura was smiling at him, while Sasuke seemed to just give off an air arrogance, and Kakashi looked like he was bored out of his mind, though Naruto swore he saw the jonin's one eye dart to him a couple of times.

Kurenai walked past Team 7 to address the Hokage, who was sitting with Iruka handing out missions. "Hokage-sama, Team 8 reporting for a mission."

Hiruzen waited for Team 7 to leave the room before looking up from the scroll he was looking at. "Alright, well Kurenai how do you think your team is doing?"

"They are working very hard sir, I think we're ready to move up." Kurenai stated beaming with pride as she gave her quick assessment of her squad.

The Hokage nodded at this then looked down at the missions he had available, before picking up a C ranked mission. "Here," tossing the scroll over to Kurenai who caught it with ease, "The mission is to escort one of the Daimyo's daughters who had been visiting rather recently. Princess Naho, will be waiting for you at the North Gate in two hours." He said with finality. "Oh and Naruto here," Tossing a second scroll to him, "I thought you might like to have that."

Naruto looked at the scroll for a second before looking at the elderly man, "Thanks jiji!" Naruto beamed a smile at him before taking off with the rest of his squad to pack.

*** North gate***

Naruto leaned up against one of the giant gates waiting for the rest of his team to arrive. He was still looking at the scroll the Hokage gave me.

It was a simple storage scroll, nothing too special only it was black, but the outside color ment absolutely nothing, it was what it held that that made him look at it with such emotion. Inside the scroll was an all black metal flute, that apparently belong to his father. He had remembered seeing it on numerous occasions when he was sifting through Kurama's memories about his parents.

Apparently the Hokage had it and was giving it too him and he couldn't help but feel so happy on the inside that he finally had something to connect him to his father. He had seen him many time, he heard stories also but he was never able to make a connection with his father no matter how hard he tried. Now he had that connection.

_**'Your father would be proud of you, you know that right Kit?'**_ Kurama asked as she listened to his thoughts.

_'Well duh! I mean look at me, who wouldn't be proud of me!' _Naruto replied laughing in his head as he realized how arrogant he sounded.

_**'Haha, don't go and get a big head now, you may be strong for your age, but there is always someone who is probably faster and stronger then you.' **_Kurama lightly reprimanded.

_'Yes, yes, I know. Don't worry that why I have you here!' _Naruto snickered, _' Besides, no matter how strong I get, your a thousand year old fox for a reason. I doubt I'll ever be able to match you in a straight up fight.'_

_**'As true as that may be, I think you might want to focus on that task at hand.'**_ Kurama smiled as she went to go lay down, _**'Oh and WHEN THE HELL ARE YOU GOING TO CHANGE THIS PLACE?! IT'S SO EMO RIGHT NOW!'**_ Kurama roared making Naruto wince as his ears rang a little.

Before he could respond Kurenai and Hinata walked up with their packs on, he looked around for Shino before he realized he was standing right next to him. _'Man this guy's stealth blows mine right out of the water! It's almost creepy how he can get around so quietly.'_

As he was trying to figure out how that a littler was being carried by four armed men and walking next to it seemed to be a scholar of some kind.

"Are you the escort that the Hokage promised us?" The man said, all of the warriors seemed to be on edge about something, as their eyes never looked at the shinobi but instead continued to scan the tree line.

Kurenai quickly stepped up, "Hai, we are. We will make sure you arrive back to the Daimyo's safely," Turning to her team, she quickly handed out orders, "Hinata up front, Naruto and Shino on the sides and I'll keep bring up the rear."

The three genin quickly took up their assigned position around the litter and slowly began the trek to the Daimyo's house.

As they started walking Hinata would activate her Byakugan every few minutes to quickly survey the area for potential threats, then turn it off to save on chakra. Shino had a few of his insects flying around the group to warn them of anything around them, it normally turned out to be a squirrel or rabbit that would run off. Naruto had sent a few shadow clones around in a protective circle, so he would be alerted to anyone sneaking up on them, and while they were keeping an eye out, he was in an argument over whether or not to play his new flute with Kurama.

_**'Please! Just one song...'**_ Kurama whined. She really loved his playing and thought he should play more often.

_'I already told you no, we're on a mission and the flute would just bring unwanted attention to us and put the client in danger. What do you think Kurenai-sensei would say if I did that hmm?'_ Naruto retorted back.

_**'Probably something along the lines of **_"Oh Kami, you play so good, please take me here and now!"**...'**She snickered.

Naruto almost face faulted on what Kurama had said and a blush that would have made Hinata proud, wove it's way up his neck and face. _'Ero-kitsune! Kurenai-sensei is not like that! Now shush, I need to concentrate on the mission.' _Naruto said while Kurama grumbled about not being listened to.

While Naruto was have his internal argument he had no idea that he was being spied on. Staring out of the litter Princess Naho was watching the blonde as they all made their way to her home. She began to wonder why he was making random facial expressions, she thought it was funny and cute. She slowly started to crawl out of the litter without realizing it until her tutor said something.

"My lady! Please get back in so we can continue and get you home." He said to her.

She looked around, she hadn't even realized that she had actually left the litter and everyone was looking at her, even the blonde boy she was watching. Feeling embarrassed and blushing heavily she quickly jumped back into the litter and closed the curtains so no one could look at her anymore.

After a while she did open the curtains again cause it was a little too dark for her liking and she tried to talk with the blonde.

"So what's your name?"

"I am Uzumaki Naruto, Naho-sama." Naruto said, trying to keep the conversation to a minimum. He was afraid he'd say something wrong, she'd get upset and he'd have to deal with the council when he got back. That was not something he found enjoyable since he could have sworn the council was only there to make his life a living hell.

She was smiling that he was talking with her and she just chatted away to him talking about anything that really came to her mind. Naruto would comment every now and then but normally just let her talk to her hearts content. He learned that she was only 8 years old and apparently from what he heard didn't really like living with the Daimyo cause he never really paid any attention to her and she didn't really have any friends, just her other sister and little brother.

They eventually stopped to give the bearers a little rest seeing as they had been carrying the litter for several hours. When they stopped Naho hopped out and walked over to Naruto as he had taken up position leaning against a tree with his eyes closed and his hands behind his head looking content.

As she approached Naruto she was quickly whisked away by her tutor again. She really hated him but he was put in charge of her safety and well being. "My lady, you need to stay around the litter, or at least with this jonin here. Remember we must keep you safe at all times." He said, lightly scolding her for trying to talk to someone he felt was far below her.

"I was just going to talk to Uzumaki-san, and there isn't any danger around!" Naho almost yelled at him.

Kurenai approached the girl and smiled at her, she knew she just wanted to be friends with the loveable kid but she couldn't help but feel highly envious of the little girl for showing affection to the boy for some reason. She didn't understand it and quickly waved it off as nothing. "Don't worry, she is perfectly safe. They may not look like it but they are very good at their jobs and will protect you with their lives." Kurenai said smiling down at the girl.

Suddenly Naruto's head snapped up and all the shinobi around him took notice. "We've got company, I saw three of them from my clone," Naruto said quickly jumping with the others as they took position around their charge.

Hinata activated her Byakugan, which seemed to frighten the guards a little, luckily Naho couldn't see her eyes so she couldn't understand why they were looking at Hinata differently now. "Sorry Naruto, there are at seven of them. The other four seem to be hanging back little ways. They're moving like shinobi sensei."

Kurenai nodded and slowly tried to form a plan in her head on how they were going to get away from all of this. Even if they were trained, she wasn't sure they could handle missing nin right now. She didn't get any time to think as all of a sudden six people walked out of the tree line and slowly walked up onto the group.

"Look, this doesn't have to be complicated at all. We were hired to take the girl, so just hand her over and we can all go about our lives peacefully. No one really has to get hurt here." One of the missing nin said after stepping forward with his hands up.

Kurenai quickly took note that from his chakra level he was at least chunin along with four of the others while the last had a genin chakra level. She tried to sense how strong the one who was hiding in the trees was but she couldn't, he was obscured from her too well.

"Oi, see if one of the girls will come with us, we could really use some entertainment tonight." The largest one there said as he grinned at the girls.

Naruto bristled at that comment, there was no way he was going to let them take either of his two teammates. He glanced at his sensei wondering what she was going to do. He knew that she wouldn't let them take the girl but he wasn't sure what she would about them. As he looked into Kurenai's eye he saw a hatred and quickly knew that she was going to go ballistic on them for even mentioning taking her or Hinata.

Naruto quickly took stock of the situation: he was against seven missing nin, most likely chunin. He had a pissed off sensei, and from the waves of hatred coming off Hinata she was pissed as well. He had frightened guards who were probably too scared to act at all, and to top it off the only two people here who were probably capable of clear thinking were him and Shino.

_'I swear, Kami, if I find out that you planned all of this for you amusement I'm going to kick your ass!'_ Naruto thought, hearing Kurama laugh at that thought.

"Sensei, why don't you keep Naho-sama safe, we'll handle this." Naruto said, followed by Shino agreeing with him. Shino figured it was only logical that she keep the charge safe seeing as she was probably the fastest out of all of them.

"I a-a-agree s-sensei, N-N-Naruto, S-Shino and I-I can take t-t-them." Hinata stuttered out. Lone behold it wasn't shyness that was making her stutter this time but rage at someone thinking she would go with anyone other then Naruto. Over the last couple months she had developed a stronger crush on him then when she was in the academy, though she was always too shy to act on it.

Kurenai smirked before heaving a sigh, "Alright but I will jump in if I think you all need help."

The three genin nodded and shifted their formation so Hinata was directly in front of Shino, and Naruto was off to the left side of them facing the enemy. Moving with lightning fast speed Hinata charged the group as Shino launched his parasitic insects at the shinobi that were on the ends. As the bugs sped past Hinata, they began attacking the missing nin while Hinata using her new stance flowed around the ones that weren't distracting by the insects and attacked them, immobilizing two right away and working on her third.

Naruto quickly ran through hand signs before whispering, "**Genjutsu: Mekura (Genjutsu: Blind Man)**" blinding all of the targets before Shino or Hinata got to the group. Naruto watched as his team quickly removed the threat, but he kept watching for any sign of that seventh missing nin.

Quickly thinking over why he hadn't found him yet, _'Okay normally in a large group you have a least one person hold back just in case of an ambush, but seeing as they weren't ambushed that can only mean that he is using them as bait, which means...'_

Naruto realizing what was going on, turned and saw that he was correct. There stood the last missing nin, about to hit a distracted Kurenai from behind. She was too focused on the fight her genin were in to notice anything else around her.

Quickly pumping chakra into his legs, he sped behind Kurenai, drawing her attention to the opponent behind her, Naruto took a kunai strike to his left shoulder before kicking the shinobi away creating distance between them. Unfortunately the kunai was still in Naruto as blood slowly fell down his left arm.

Naruto without thinking ripped the offending object out of his shoulder. He was aware of the high pitched gasp from Naho behind him and the curse that Kurenai said for not being more observant. Naruto had heard all of it but ignored it all, he ran through trained hand signs for his own personal jutsu. "**Magen: Jigoku no mon(Demon Illusion: Gate of Hell)**" Naruto yelled out.

The missing nin's eyes quickly clouded over as the genjutsu over came him. All looked at the young blonde as a gate rose behind him. The iron gate had chains wrapped around it and small torches adorned the side. As soon as the hate appeared the chains broke and the gate was thrown open as a huge skeletal hand reached out of a burning portal beyond the gate. The hand caught fire and reached for the man.

As experienced as the missing nin was with genjutsu he was just too scared to try to break it as the hand grabbed him and he screamed feeling the fires wrap around him and slowly encase his body. He had never felt such pain before in his life and the flames caused by the hand that was pulling him further past the gate.

Naruto moving quickly seeing that the jutsu had taken effect after the man screamed bloody murder, threw the man's own kunai and having it sink into his left eye socket. The man's body seized for a split second before it fell forward, further lodging the metal weapon into the man's skull.

Kurenai quickly moved to her student to see to his injuries. "I'm sorry Naruto, I should have been paying more attention to what was around me. I was just worried about the other's fight and didn't even remember about that seventh man." Kurenai said as she quickly removed Naruto's black jacket to see the small hole.

"Well it doesn't matter anymore, though I will getting stabbed sucks so much!" Naruto complained as his sensei was placing gauze over the wound before wrapping it up. Naruto only winced as he could feel Kurama slowly start to heal the wound.

"Still, I don't want you to be throwing yourself in front of the kunai anymore. It was my mistake and it's only because of my lack of awareness that you got hurt..." Kurenai started to say before she realized she was scolding him for saving her, "But thank you for protecting me."

Naruto just smiled and whispered so only she could hear, "No problem, you can count on that anytime." Before she could respond to that Naho quickly rushed Naruto and hugged his leg crying.

"I'm sorry, you got hurt cause of me, I'm so very sorry." Naho balled out, sobs wrecking her tiny frame.

Naruto not sure what to do patted her head before kneeling down and smiling at he, "I'm alright, it's just a little scratch." He said as he continued to try to sooth her, as he looked into her tear filled eyes.

Naho quickly hugged him forcing a small wince as she clung to his now injured shoulder, and without realizing it receiving a two jealous glares at her. Naruto patted her on the back before her tutor quickly walked up to them from where he had hidden himself and quickly ushered her back into her litter.

She tried to fight him on it saying that they should rest a little longer seeing as how Naruto was injured and progressing would only slow them down in the future if he pushed his injury. Laughing Naruto quickly made replacement clones for the ones that had been on guard duty and moved to his original position in the formation.

The team quickly took up their positions again after checking to make sure everyone was read and began their journey again only with the addition of a clone walking on Naruto's left side. Naho was now very adamant about chatting with Naruto as they made their way to her home.

***Daimyo's Estate***

After arriving finally at the gates to the estate, they were greeted by a contingent of guards that quickly surrounded the group and walked them inside the walls, toward the courtyard.

Arriving at the courtyard, they were greeted by the steward, as he and a small group of servants walked down the many stairs leading from the main entrance. The genin stayed back as Kurenai quickly escorted Naho, up half the stairs, and handed her and her escort over to the steward and his guards. After receiving the payment scroll, team 8 quickly headed out, happy to be moving at a much faster pace.

"So Naruto, it seemed that Naho-sama was quiet fond of you." Kurenai said, slightly teasing but for some reason irritated as well.

"I k-know right? S-she wouldn't stop t-t-talking with N-Naruto-kun." Hinata giggled out, she was irritated at the whole situation, but still found it kind of funny.

"To be honest, I'm happy she's gone. I was afraid I'd say something stupid and have to deal with the Daimyo himself," Naruto shivered at the thought, "I never did like politicians."

_**'Psh, that's the understatement of the year. Didn't you at one point try to figure out where all of the council members lived and go on a prank rampage?'**_

_'And if jiji didn't find out about my snooping I would have gotten away with it too damnit!'_ Naruto thought back.

_**'Language!'**_ Kurama scolded quickly.

_'Sorry, I'll try to watch that.'_ Naruto said as he turned his focus onto what his teammates were saying.

"I think we should take a quick break, let's change those bandages and rest a little. We're not far from the village now." Kurenai said.

All four of them slowed down and dropped out of the trees next to a small river. Kurenai walked over to Naruto and had him remove his bandages only to see the wound had pretty much healed itself.

_'Wow, I didn't think anyone could heal like this, then again he had the fox so I guess this might actually be normal for him.'_ Kurenai said as she removed the bandages completely.

"Well it looks like you don't actually need to wrap it anymore, well rest up."

Naruto nodded before he sat down and looked at his shirt. _'That's going to be a pain to fix...' _Naruto said. Not wanting to wait he pulled his shirt off and pulled out a small sewing kit and began to patch up his shirt.

Unknown to him, both women were staring at his ripped chest and stomach both having the same though, _'Wow...'_.

Hinata's imagination started to go into over drive as she look at Naruto and began to fantasize about them together. Her famous blush started to creep up and steam could almost be seen coming off her face from the blush.

Kurenai was having just as hard of a time looking at him and not blushing, but she was able to keep it from getting too noticeable. Instead of staring at his body too long and begin to wonder how he got a body like that, she watched him patch up his shirt, with practiced hands. _'He can play music, he can sew, and he's not afraid to protect someone with his life... If I'm not careful here I might actually start to fall for him.'_

Having finished the repairs to his shirt, Naruto quickly slipped it back and noticed the sad looks in both of the women's faces. _'Hmm, wonder what's up with them?'_

_**'God could you be any thicker?'**_ Kurama groaned out. It wasn't the first time he had been too thick to notice something like this, she had slowly become used to it.

_'What do you mean? Come on tell me!'_ Naruto was rather interested now.

_**'If I did, then it would defeat the purpose of it all. Now if I were you, I'd get ready to leave like the rest of your squad.'**_

Naruto looked up and saw that everyone was getting ready to leave, so he threw his sewing kit back into his backpack, and moved with them, headed quickly back to the Konoha.


	4. Chapter 4

**Okay, so just a quick note before we get into the good stuff.**

**First All voting is done! Not many people ended up voting so to say it was tight… Yeah doesn't mean a WHOLE lot. Anyway Harem is decided! Kurenai, Hinata, Yugao, Anko, and Temari (though I could cut out Temari if I really don't feel like she's doing much for the story). If you didn't vote you can't complain, and if you did… sorry there just weren't enough since Anko and Temari won several votes over everyone else.**

**Second thanks to the help of Skeek622 with some advise they shared, there will be a wave arc, and no hating please because I will make it move in smooth and truth be told it won't play that big of a part in all of it.**

**Third… Ah screw it, lets just get to the damn fanfic.**

**I don't own anything of Naruto.**

***Konoha, Hokage's Office***

After returning from their mission, Team 8 now was standing before the Hokage giving their mission debrief. Needless to say Naruto, Shino, and Hinata were a little tired from the trip, and rather bored from the debrief. Hiruzen watched as the three genin slowly let their attentions slide away and their eyes were wandering aimlessly.

"…And that's everything that happened Hokage-sama." Kurenai said. She had finished giving the rundown of the mission, including the fact that Naruto was injured but healed before they could return to Konoha.

Hiruzen nodded before looking at the team. "Okay, you're all dismissed. Naruto I'd like you to stay for a second if you don't mind." Shino and Hinata turned to leave the room, leaving Kurenai and Naruto with the Hokage.

"Okay Naruto, I'd like to know something really quick. According the Kurenai you're very good with your genjutsu and I can't help but ask myself why that is. I mean no offence, but for someone your age and with the amount of chakra you possess it seems almost impossible."

Naruto nodded knowing that he was bound to be asked this sooner or later. To tell the truth he was beginning to wander if they would ever ask as he expected it to be asked a lot earlier. "Jiji the way I'm able to cast genjutsu is really simple. I split my chakra in two so I only have to focus on controlling half of my chakra instead of all of it."

"Would you mind clarifying that for me?" The Hokage asked leaning forward on his desk.

Naruto nodded, "When I go to use chakra, I control only half of it and allow the other half to recycle back through my system or release it and allow my chakra to spread over the area. I figure I could confuse most dojutsu with this especially the Byakugan who wouldn't be able to tell if they're in a genjutsu or not because of all of the chakra around them."

Hiruzen was astounded that Naruto had come up with such a solution that he was speechless for a little bit. Kurenai was beginning to see her student in a whole new light. Naruto had actually come up with a way to get around his huge chakra capacity and he had the skill with the art to almost say he had mastered it. Add to the fact that he had a really good body, and was vastly more mature then most people ten years his senior and she could almost say that she was falling for him. _'If only he was a few years older, hell if he makes chunin I probably might not care…'_ Kurenai thought, now completely forgetting where she was and began to blush at the implications of her thoughts.

Hiruzen saw the slight blush on Kurenai and chuckled inwardly. "Okay Naruto, here is a second question. Why don't you just try to specialize in ninjutsu? It wouldn't be all the hard considering your chakra…"

As the Hokage was saying this Naruto began shaking his head, "That's not what I want to do. I feel that people who rely on ninjutsu have a tendency to develop almost a god complex, and they can go so far overboard and cause massive amounts of damage to not only their enemies but could cause a backlash and harm allies as well."

Kurenai having come back out of the daze when Naruto began to answer could only smirk, "And what about your genjutsu you used on the chunin missing nin? He screamed more from your jutsu then if Ibiki was interrogating him."

Hiruzen's eyebrow raised at that, "What jutsu is this?"

"Sensei is talking about my **Magen: Jigoku no mon(Demon Illusion: Gate of Hell)**." Naruto quickly stated.

"Would you mind showing me? To scare someone as bad as Kurenai says then it must be something." The Hokage asked.

Naruto was unsure at first then finding no real reason not to he quickly ran through the hand sign. "**Magen: Jigoku no mon(Demon Illusion: Gate of Hell)**" He whispered.

Hiruzen's vision darkened and he began to see the same sight, and feel the same fear that the missing nin had. Quickly seeing the distress on the Hokage's face, Naruto ended the jutsu.

After calming himself, Hiruzen quickly asked why it worked so well. "You see, it's not a jutsu I can teach because I harness the Kyubi's killing intent and allow it to flow with my chakra. What normally is supposed to happen is you feel so much fear that you forget to dispel the genjutsu, effectively keeping you in place for me to make a kill. I actually developed a few others but only that was can be used for combat."

While Naruto explained the Hokage could do nothing but agree with him. Out of all the years of war and conflict Hiruzen had never felt so scared in his life then he was then. When he heard Naruto finish he couldn't help but wonder what these other genjutsu were.

Kurenai for her part was a little downtrodden that she couldn't learn the jutsu after seeing the effect it had on the Hokage, but since it involved the fox she knew she could never learn it. Her mind began to wonder if she could harness her own killing intent and use it like Naruto did with his jutsu.

"Naruto if you don't mind me asking, what other jutsu are you referring to?" Hiruzen asked.

"Oh well most of it is for disguises, I've been able to freak out a lot of the villagers who have come to try to harass me. It's a lot of fun, they always run away screaming." Naruto chuckled at the memories.

"Well Naruto, I'd like to have you test on something if you don't mind. If your skills are this advanced I'm wondering what you could do in our T&I department. Of course you wouldn't be able to work there, but you could intern, and then when you become chunin you could work part time there."

Kurenai started to stare at the teen and imagined a blond boy Anko, and it sent a shiver up her spine. _'No! That can't happen!'_ "Hokage-sama, are you sure that's okay? I mean there are some people down there that could influence him. Not to mention that many people who work there are known to have issues that develop and not many can work outside of T&I without cause problems for other people." Kurenai said letting a little worry slip into her voice.

"I know that, but I think it might be a place he could shine, and no one is going to force him to work there. I just want to see if he could do well there and if he does if he'd like to work there." Hiruzen said trying to calm her fears.

Naruto just listened to the conversation, wondering what it would be like to work there. Remember old stories that Kurama had told him of ancient torturing, he couldn't help but shiver and feel queasy. "Do I have to jiji?" Naruto asked hoping to get out of it.

"Yes, for now at least I want you to see how it goes. I know it's not for everyone," the Hokage said shrugging his shoulders, "But who knows, maybe it could be a calling you never knew you had."

Naruto let his shoulders droop ever so slightly before nodding his head and asking if he could be excused. Hiruzen nodded to the boy and watched his surrogate grandson leave the room. "Hokage-sama, if he must be there I'm going to request that he receive twice as many psych evaluations because of his age." Kurenai asked, if she couldn't stop him for working there then she would try to have some notice so she could convince him to stop in time before any actually damage is done.

"Seeing as he is young, I'll allow it. I'll inform Ibiki and have him personally give the evaluations." The Hokage said, grabbing a scroll and began writing. Kurenai took this opportunity to leave and head home so she could relax.

***Next day at T&I***

Naruto stood in front of the build like he had for that last 15 minutes. He was stalling going in cause he really just didn't want to.

'_**Come on, it won't be so bad. Trust me I'll be here for you and tell you when to get out okay? Not to mention if I miss something from the rumors this Morino person is really good at his job both with interrogatives and his staff.'**_ Kurama said trying to comfort the boy.

Naruto heaved a sigh and once again held the scroll that was delivered to him last night by an ANBU he knew rather well. Drumming up his confidence as best he could, Naruto opened the door and walked inside. He wasn't sure what to expect, but what he saw certainly wasn't it.

The room looked like any office waiting room. There were chairs set out and a secretary who seemed to be writing on paperwork, or so he assumed. The lighting was rather nice too as he wasn't hit with florescent lights, but the gentle lighting of soft lamps that were placed around the room. Naruto walked up to the secretary and was asked to wait just a moment.

"Okay, sorry about that, how can I help you?" the secretary asked.

"Umm… This is the T&I department right?" Naruto asked, wondering if he had walked into the wrong building.

"Yes it is you know that question gets asked a lot. So what can I help you with?" The secretary asked again.

"Hokage-sama sent me here to give this to Ibiki and be placed in an internship." Naruto said handing out the scroll to her. She took it, unrolled it and quickly read it.

"Okay, why don't you have a seat and I'll give Morino-san a quick call." She said. Naruto walked over to one of the chairs and sat down. He didn't lean back but placed his elbows on his knees to prop himself up. He didn't know how long he was going to be waiting so he didn't want to get too comfortable.

Not ten minutes after the secretary made the call when Ibiki Morino walked into the room. He seized Naruto up and began to wonder what the Hokage was doing sending a kid here for an internship. Ignoring the blonde teen he walked over to confirm the scroll, just in case. He didn't want this to be a joke or anything.

After seeing the Hokage's seal of approval he motioned for the kid to follow him. Naruto quickly got up and rushed to the man's side as he walked through a double set of doors and they both boarded an elevator.

As they began their descent further underground Ibiki turned to Naruto. "Okay, I'm not sure why the Hokage wants a brat of a genin to intern here but orders are orders. Okay now here is how this is going to work. You will shadow one of my men for a week in which time if there are no adverse effects from your surroundings then we will continue week by week. This will continue until you're a chunin, and then you can figure out if you want to work here or not."

Naruto nodded but stayed quiet, "Okay, now the Hokage said that you're pretty good at using genjutsu, so I'm going to assume that your good enough to try to pull information out of people, otherwise you wouldn't be here. Now here at Konoha's T&I department, we have a few people who stand above the others and specialize in certain things. I myself specialize in the mind, I don't really like all the blood and gore of real torture so I choose to focus on psychological torture. I find it a lot more satisfying. Next will be Yamanaka Inoichi, he is the clan head of the Yamanaka and a master at his clan's mind walking jutsu. He can use his jutsu to actually see into your memories for the information we want, though you might not see him as much cause he has a business to run as well as work here. The last and more sadistic of the notable people here is Mitarashi Anko, she heads our physical torture department. She's learned to push the body to the brink, and like the rest of us, is very good at it. All I ask is that your respectful, I don't need to be sending you to the hospital because you said something stupid."

Naruto after hearing all of this was actually worried about what he was getting into. _'These people sound crazy! I'm not sure I'm going to make it out of here with what little sanity I have.'_

'_**Oh you're such a worry-wart! You'll do fine, trust me.'**_ Kurama said, one again hoping to calm the boy down.

As they arrived at the final floor, the doors opened and they stepped out into a hallway made almost completely out of metal. "Okay, now you will be shadowing Inoichi, Anko, or myself while you're here. You will be required to be here for at least 15 hours a week, and you are not allowed anywhere down here without one of us with you. Now come with me to my office, I have a short test I have to give you before you can do anything."

With that both walked into the first office they came too, Ibiki closed the door to begin the test.

*** 30 minutes later ***

The door opened and revealed a tired looking Naruto and a somewhat satisfied Ibiki. _'Well now that, that's done what should we do next?'_ Ibiki thought.

Before he could try to brain storm any ideas a messenger quickly ran down the hallway toward the two. "Morino-san! A message from ANBU HQ!" The messenger yelled, quickly handing the scroll to the older man. Quickly opening it and reading it Ibiki sighed, it was both a happy and annoyed sigh.

"Well Naruto, looks like I've got to go help the ANBU," He said quickly spotting Anko walking out of one of the torture rooms looking rather happy with herself, "But Anko over there will take you to get your gear and then show you out. We'll start your shadowing next week, but for now talk with her to get a feel for everything."

Ibiki quickly Anko's attention and told her what to do with Naruto. "Come on! Don't ruin my day now! I just got what we needed from prisoner 743, was going to get some dango and now you throw this on me!" Anko said seething ever so slightly causing Ibiki to sweat drop.

Naruto had some experience with women, though not much. What he did know was that if they were mad for whatever reason either quickly make them happy and defuse the situation right away or run like the Shinigami is after you. Seeing as the only way out was through an elevator he quickly decided to defuse the situation as best as he could. "Umm, what if I pay for the dango?" Naruto said, as it was the first thing that came to his mind.

What happened next was so fast that you'd have to slow it down in slow motion to see it all. Anko heard what he said and moved so fast, that even the Raikage would have been stunned, quickly grabbed Naruto and hugged him forcing his head between her rather large bosom. Naruto for his part felt as if he was being killed as Anko began to squeeze him so hard he couldn't breathe and quickly passed out.

"Oh Kami gaki, where have you been all my life!" Anko said in almost a purr as she started to swing him around while keeping him in the vice grip of the hug.

"Umm, Anko, you might want to let him go before he suffocates." Ibiki said, not envying the boy in the least.

Anko looked down at the boy and noticed he was turning slightly blue before she let him fall to the floor, she quickly grabbed him by the foot and dragged him to get his gear while skipping the whole way.

"I feel so sorry for him…" Ibiki muttered before turning and heading toward the elevator to see what the ABNU needed help with.

*** With Anko and Naruto ***

Naruto had finally regained conciseness and looked around him. He noticed he was in a room with a bunch of black, blue, and tan trench coats. He saw Anko looking through them as she wasn't wearing hers. "Umm, Mitarashi-san, what are you doing?" Naruto asked standing up.

Anko turned and Naruto was given a full few of breasts only in her mesh shirt. Naruto was forced to fight a nose-bleed from the view. "First off gaki just call me Anko, I'm not really all that formal; And second I needed a new coat and you need to get yours too. It's standard uniform, these coats have storage seals in them and are made of some pretty durable stuff. Go ahead and pick whichever one you want, also if you're interested there are some gloves over there," Anko pointed to a corner with a boxes of individually paired gloves, "if you want. I never really see the point in them."

Naruto grabbed a black trench coat, and though about getting some gloves before he decided against it. Anko had finished putting her coat on and then motioned for him, and he walked over to her. She put her hand on his shoulder and shunshin to her favorite dango restaurant. Seeing the restaurant Naruto sighed as he remember what he said and hung his head for a second wandering if it had been his smartest move or not. He didn't really get to think on it as Anko grabbed him by his hand and quickly dragged him with her while she cheered "DANGO! DANGO!"

As they entered the establishment Naruto walked with Anko to a booth and a waitress quickly came to take their order. "I'll have my usual with some tea," Anko started before looking at Naruto.

"I'll just have the same as her." Naruto replied. Anko gave him an approving nod as the waitress quickly walked away. "So I guess this is the part where I'm supposed to ask how T&I work is right?"

Anko looked at him for a second before chuckling, "Let me guess, you have no interest working there do you?" Naruto shook his head cause Anko to laugh again. "Don't worry, from what Ibiki told me this is just an internship that the Hokage set up. I'm still wondering why the old man would try to send a gaki down to us though."

Anko knew who Naruto was, hell every jonin that worked with ANBU knew who he was. Most of the villagers saw him as the demon and sadly a lot of the shinobi did as well. Not at all unfamiliar to what she called "The ways of village stupidity" she knew what he was going through, as she herself had been treated as an outcast for a long time. Anko never could wrap it around her head why people made assumptions before ever getting to know someone.

Naruto quickly answered the question for her, "Jiji thought it would be where I could, and I quote, _"shine"_. To be honest I think he's been smoking a little too much and it's finally catching up to him."

"What made him think that? You hiding some nasty tricks or something?" Anko inquired further.

"All I did was use a genjutsu on him, scared him a little and now he thinks I'm ready to start questioning battle hardened shinobi." Naruto said with sarcasm dripping from the last few words.

Anko was impressed to say the least. Not many chose to use genjutsu, in fact only her friend Kurenai used it as her primary skill. To see someone of Naruto's age use it AND be able to frighten the Hokage of all people was impressive to say the least. "Well, mind showing me this special genjutsu of yours?" Anko asked as their waitress was walking back with their tea and dango.

"Sure if that's what you want, but after lunch." Naruto said which he then started to eat the dango. Little did he know that he would soon be addicted to them just like he was with ramen. Anko nodded and quickly turned her attention from Naruto to her dango.

Shortly after paying for the both of them, Naruto and Anko walked over to the closest training ground so he could show her the genjutsu. As they walked up he realized it was his team's training ground and mentally remembered where that dango shop was for future references.

"Okay you ready?" Naruto asked, still not full sure he should be using this jutsu on friendly ninja. As he asked this Kurenai and Hinata started to walk up and saw Naruto facing Anko. As soon as Hinata saw Naruto in the black trench coat, she quickly was thrown back from the nose bleed.

'_How is it even possible for him to look even hotter! This isn't good, I'm not sure I could speak to him. I'm not even sure I'll be able to live from the blood loss!'_ Hinata said. Little did she know Kurenai was fighting a nose bleed as well and having similar thoughts.

Completely oblivious to their audience, Anko nodded and Naruto quickly moved through memorized hand signs, "**Magen: Jigoku no mon**" Naruto whispered, and quickly prepared to dispel it when he thought she would be in trouble.

Anko stood there for a few seconds before sweat began to form on her brow and her eyes widened. Naruto saw this and knew the tell-tell signs of someone being in distress from the jutsu and quickly ended it, hoping he caught it before he knew the hand would grab her. He knew that if the hand would have grabbed her she would be screaming and he wouldn't be able to calm her down from the pain for several minutes.

Naruto saw that she was out of the jutsu and visibly shook herself for a second. "I'll hand it to you gaki, that's very impressive. I can see why the Hokage wanted you with us. That jutsu alone would break a lot of people; I hope you do know that I will have to tell Ibiki about this right?" Anko said, trying to get rid of the feeling she had in her head. The image itself wasn't all that terrifying it was the feeling that seemed to burrow into her head that got to her.

Naruto sighed, "Sure, I understand. There's no possible way for me to bribe you from not telling him is there?"

"Well, you could always by my dango for me…" Anko began to say.

"Go ahead and tell him." Naruto quickly interrupted her. _'I'd run out of money too quickly paying for both of our dango and my ramen!'_

'_**You know the obvious solution to that would be to stop eating both right?'**_ Kurama quickly asked.

Everything was quiet for a second in Naruto's head and she wondered if he had heard her or not. _'HOW CAN YOU SPEAK SUCH HERESY!' _Naruto screamed in his head.

Kurama could do nothing but groan and roll her eyes, giving up and knowing that it would be a waste of effort to get him to stop his bad habits. She had tried long ago, and though she succeeded in getting him to eat healthier she couldn't get him to stop all together. She was sure that if ramen ever was outlawed that he would go to war.

"Hey Naruto! You in there?" Kurenai asked bending down slightly to poke him in the face.

Shaking his head, he looked at her and smile. "Sorry Kurenai-sensei, was just deep in thought."

Kurenai nodded her understanding, "So you free for now or are you busy with Anko?" she asked the blonde.

Anko quickly started to walk away from the group, "Nope, he starts working with us next week, though I might come around to help train him a little for T&I." Anko quickly vanished from sight, as she was now off and wanted to go take a nap.

Kurenai quickly had Naruto and Hinata spar for a bit, and he was actually winning which surprised him a lot since he normally sucked at taijutsu. Little did he know that Hinata was having difficulty concentrating on the task at hand, and instead she was fantasizing about her and Naruto.

*** One week later ***

Naruto laid in the grass of the training ground watching the clouds pass by as he listened to the sounds of Kurenai and Shino sparing. Hinata was laying close by reading a small little blue book while she had a blush on her face. She had begun to read it earlier in the week and she had done everything she could to not let anyone read it over her shoulder so no one could see what it was she was reading. She even went so far as to remove the coverings so they couldn't tell what the book was at all. Little did everyone know that it was one of the books from the Icha Icha series, and that Hinata was actually a really big fan.

Naruto as he looked up to the sky and remembered the last week of training he had, a lot of it with Anko and how to "read" people. She taught him how to take in a person's facial expressions, breathing, and several other things so he could take in their mood and mental state. She also said she would train him to use the weapons for torture. Even though he said he didn't need to, she still forced him to learn how to use either a kunai or senbon properly and he chose the latter of the two. Naruto had though he'd try to learn how to use it for combat, little did he know that when he asked Anko's training style turned into "learn by having it done to you". Naruto had gone home just about every day looking like a pin cushion. At least he finally got the hang of how to use them properly and with rather good accuracy.

Naruto looked around and saw Hinata looking at him, doing what he thought was a damn good impression of a tomato. "Hey Hinata you okay? The sun getting to you?" Naruto asked, a little worried for his teammate.

Hearing Naruto's voice seemed to snap her out of her fantasy and she looked at him, "O-o-oh, I'm j-j-just fine. N-n-nothing to worry a-a-about, N-N-Naruto." Hinata quickly responded, turning back to her book. _'God, I really need to control when I start to fantasize about him; but why can't he do something like in this book!' _Hinata yelled in her head.

Anko was sitting in a tree watching the scene unfold before her and she couldn't help but chuckle, _'Gaki, how thick could you possible get? I mean really, almost anyone could see that she's totally falling for you, though it's funny you're not even trying to do anything.'_ With another chuckle, Anko grabbed a couple of senbon and launched them at Naruto.

Naruto was lucky that he was watching a cloud as it passed over the tree line to see the senbon being launched at him. Naruto cursed out loud and rolled to dodge the projectiles, and jumped up and unsealed his own from the trench coat he now wore regularly, unknown how happy it made his two female teammates.

Naruto's quick movement was caught by the others of his team and they all had their attention looking for the one who launched the weapons. Hinata quickly activated her Byakugan only to see another set of senbon already launched at her teammate.

Naruto saw the movement and launched his own senbon where he though Anko was hiding. Anko had moved behind his position and when he threw his senbon, she quickly rushed his position with a kunai drawn. Naruto heard movement behind him and turned just in time to dodge backwards narrowly missing a kunai cutting his chest only for it to cut his shirt wide open. Anko maneuvered behind the genin and grabbed the trench coat, and made an attempt to pin him on the ground.

Needless to say Naruto slipped out of the coat and rolled forward, and pulled out more senbon and launched them at Anko. She had forbidden him from using any other weapons while he was learning how to use senbon, though she never followed her own rule. She kept saying it made things much more interesting, and his opponents wouldn't just be using senbon so why should she.

The senbon were about to hit Anko when she quickly used a kawarimi, and they a dummy body. Anko then walked out of the tree line and walked over to the dummy to see where the senbon had hit. This had also been a common occurrence during what Naruto referred to as "Anko's sadistic idea of training".

Anko noted the pattern of where the needles had landed and nodded at how effective it would have been, "Good gaki, that would have immobilized the target quickly," Anko said taking a second look at the body only to see one hadn't pierced a nerve cluster but would have sliced open a main artery, "Oh hey, hold everything gaki. That one right there would have been a kill shot…" Anko then looked at him, "WERE YOU TRYING TO KILL ME!" Anko shouted.

Naruto looked really nervous then, he had only thrown on instinct not really meaning to go for a kill. "Umm, well you see that was a total accident. I moved purely on instinct…" That was all Naruto could get out before he was being chased by Anko, who was promising an up close and personal demonstration of her torture techniques.

Kurenai, now realizing it was Anko told Shino to take a break. "Hey Anko, would you mind not killing him, we have a mission to go pick up in an hour and I don't want to explain why he's in the hospital."

Anko slowed to a stop and huffed muttering something about lucky blondes. Naruto now seeing that he wasn't going to be made into sashimi, slowed to a stop and proceeded to remove his now destroyed shirt and unseal a new one. Naruto caught a glimpse before he put on the new shirt that both Hinata and Kurenai were staring at him with a twinkle in their eyes. "Umm… Can I help either one of you?" Naruto asked.

'_Yes you can!' _they both yelled in their heads. "Nope." They both said quickly turning away to hide blushes.

Naruto shrugged his shoulders and put the new shirt on and walked over to retrieve his coat. Putting it on and dusting it off he quickly retrieved his senbon from the dummy and resealed them.

*** Hokage's office an Hour later***

Team 8 walked into the Hokage's office to see the elderly man behind a rather large pile of paper work. "Hokage-sama, reporting as requested." Kurenai said.

Hiruzen looked at each of the genin and smile, only for the smile to broaden even more when he saw Naruto in the black trench coat. "Ah, good, well let us not waste much time. Here is your mission," Toss Kurenai a C rank mission, "this will be done by two teams, but we're sending your team right away. Team 10 should arrive one day after you do, and from there you should be able to finish the mission with no problem." Hiruzen said.

Kurenai quickly scanned the scroll and nodded, then turning to her team, "Alright, quickly run home and pack for a week, meet at the west gate in an hour." With that the team quickly dispersed, all three running home to gather the supplies they would need.

***Konoha's West gate***

Naruto had been the first to arrive at the gate and sat there waiting for his team. He already had several days' worth of supplies sealed in scrolls. All he had to do was run home and grab a few of the scrolls then grab anything extra he thought he might need, or in one case didn't need. Naruto had grabbed his father's flute without even realizing it and stuffed the scroll into his backpack. Now he had pulled it out and was staring at it wondering why he had grabbed it.

'_**Hey not to disturb your thinking or anything but I have something to give you. I need you to come in here really quick.'**_ Kurama said.

Naruto closed his eyes and leaned against the giant door and entered his mindscape.

*** Naruto's Mindscape***

Naruto was standing in the middle of a giant forest near a mountain side with a waterfall nearby from the sound of the noise. He was still impressed with how well he did in creating a new space for Kurama so she could have more space with she went into her demon form.

Speaking of said demon, Kurama quickly walked up to Naruto and smiled. He normally visited every night, but she hadn't called him here for a visit. Toss a large scroll at Naruto who caught it with both hand, "Open that up and sign it." Kurama told him.

"What is it?" Naruto asked.

"The fox summoning scroll, you have no idea how hard it was to conjure it in here. I normally carry it around but when that damn Uchiha found me I accidently dropped it. Getting it sent not only to you, but to your mindscape was a pain." Kurama complained.

Naruto just nodded, opened it up and did as he was instructed. Kurama quickly went through the hand signs with him, which he got really quickly. Whenever Kurama wanted to teach Naruto something he always paid attention, almost to the point of blocking everything else out.

"Okay, now unlike most other summons you'd have to go through a test, but because you house me that's not needed. Now I should tell you that the fox's aren't really combat summons. There are a few you can do combat but normally they like to stay as support. Most fox's know a little medical ninjutsu, just about all can cast genjutsu and some with the rare ability to amplify your own for a short period of time. Now that that is over I'm tired." And with that Kurama gave Naruto a pat on the head and walked off to nap.

"Psh, she can be so lazy at times, I wonder if she could have been influenced by the Nara's at one point in time." Naruto muttered to himself before leaving his mindscape.

*** Outside the Mindscape ***

Naruto opened his eyes to see that all of his team were there, though Hinata seemed to be just getting there. "Ah, Naruto good your up. Well let's get going. When we get there we'll set up a watch and wait for Team 10 to arrive before we do anything." Kurenai said as she walked out of the gates and jumped into the trees quickly followed by the rest of the team.

"Sensei, mind tell us what we're doing?" Shino asked.

"We're going to protect a noble of the land of fire. Apparently he's been having trouble with bandits lately. They seem to only be doing hit and run attacks on his estate, but he isn't sure if his guards can handle them so he gave us the mission." Kurenai quickly told them. The mission seemed pretty straight forward, and that's what put Naruto on edge.

"Kurenai-sensei, what else is there? The Hokage wouldn't send two teams for simple bandits that were annoying a noble. You wouldn't even send that if they were attacking the Daimyo let alone a small time noble." Naruto asked.

Kurenai looked at Naruto and only smiled at how well he quickly caught on, "Your right, the noble suspects that there may be some missing nin hidden in with the bandits. There weren't reports of anything really big so we're suspecting either genin to low-chunin level enemies." Kurenai said, focusing for a second to jump to another branch, and looked back at her team to make sure no one was lagging behind. "Okay, let's speed this up a little so we don't fall further behind."

The three genin nodded and picked up the pace.

**Okay, sorry this chapter might suck a little, but it is just a filler chapter. I just wanted to quickly remind everyone that the voting is over, and I should be able to pump out chapters a little faster now that the big decisions are taken care of.**

**Remember to please review and if you have any questions regarding the story please feel free to send me a message and I will respond as quickly as I can.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Okay, sorry This didn't get out earlier, I got caught up in trying to be lazy over the weekend… okay that's not completely true. I was working on a second story I want to put out and I just got caught up in that. I feel bad because even though I spent a lot of time on it, I feel it's still not ready for everyone yet.**

**Okay so this is going to be a two part arc, so I'm going to apologize first about leaving it have finished. Sorry for those who hate cliffhangers as much as I do, but I'm going to get the next chapter out ASAP since I already know what's going to go down. So without further ado…**

*** Somewhere in the middle of the forest ***

As the sun was streaming through the canopy of the trees as Team 8 jumped from tree to tree toward their mission objective. They traveled in silence, focusing solely on their mission and moving as quickly through the trees. "Okay, lets stop here for a short break." Kurenai said with a slight huff in her voice. She turned around to see two of the three genin quickly collapse on the ground breathing heavily. Naruto looked only slightly winded but was recovering quickly.

They had been traveling for five hours, going at a rather good pace. Another six and they would be at their client's estate. Kurenai sat down next to a tree, being careful of her dress and making sure not to flash any of her genin teammates. Naruto pulled a scroll out of his trench coat and unsealed four canteens of water and a few ration bars and offered it to his team, which each of them gladly accepted his offer. They each sat back and all you could hear was the soft chewing and drinking from the team.

"Okay, so who are we guarding again?" Naruto asked, not remembering who it was.

"The man's name is Junichiro Nakasone; he owns a lot of land around here so remember to be respectful." Kurenai said looking at Naruto.

"What? Oh come on I was respectful on the last mission…" Naruto attempted to defend himself.

"You flirted with the client!" Kurenai said back quickly.

"I was not! The little brat just kept talking to me, what was I supposed to do? Ignore her?" Naruto countered. _'Wonder why she's so bothered by it…'_ Naruto thought.

'_**That's it! I'm going to find that cluster of brain cells in here that makes you so damn thick and so on a rampage all over them!'**_ Kurama yelled.

'_What do you mean that make me thick?!'_ Naruto asked.

'_**Seriously, you need to figure this out on your own. Though I wish you would hurry up, I mean really as funny as it was, now it's just getting annoying.'**_ Kurama said with a sigh.

Naruto just couldn't wrap his head around what she was saying and was so lost in his thoughts he wasn't paying attention to his thoughts anymore. "Naruto… Naruto… NARUTO!" Kurenai yelled, not two feet in front of him, startling him.

"Oh, sorry sensei, was lost in my thoughts that's all." Naruto said with a sheepish grin and his hand behind his head.

Kurenai shook her head, "I asked how much has Anko taught you? I need to know if we should capture someone to see if they have any useful intel or not." Kurenai said looking down on the blonde.

"Well she's taught me a little, but nothing extensive, and to be honest I wouldn't know what questions to ask if we even could capture someone." Naruto said looking down with a slight shiver thinking about his training with Anko.

"Well since you were taught something, we'll try anyway. I'll just have to ask the questions then, and remember if you don't think you can handle it just let me know." Kurenai said, with concern lacing into her voice. She was still worried about him shadowing in T&I and how it could change him. He was there one day and it already changed his outfit, though she wasn't complaining.

Shino at that time decided that he would ask the question that was bugging him **[A/N: No pun intended]**, "Naruto, why are you receiving training from Mitarashi-san?"

"Well the Hokage, in this infinite wisdom thought it would be smart to have me intern at T&I so she's helping me out with basic stuff. Teaching me how to read people, some torture methods and how best to use weapons. Truth be told I think Anko just is having fun trying to kill me and the Hokage has gone crazy." Naruto said with a shrug of his shoulders.

Shino nodded getting his answer and took another swig of his canteen before capping it off and tossing it back to Naruto to seal it up. Kurenai placed hers and Hinata's canteen with Shino's and thanked him. Naruto sealed them up and slipped it back into a hidden pocket in the coat.

Naruto looked forward and was given a quick glimpse of Kurenai's inner thigh and froze. Kurenai saw this and looked at him before following his gaze. Seeing where he was looking her face began to get red, whether from anger or embarrassment she didn't know. Naruto's brain quickly reengaged and he looked at Kurenai, thanking Kami that Hinata and Shino hadn't seen him looking.

"Naruto, can I speak with you for a quick moment… NOW!" Kurenai growled out. Naruto's faced paled a little but he just nodded after finally standing. Both walked with Kurenai leading Naruto a little ways away from his team so they couldn't hear anything.

*** With Naruto and Kurenai***

"Okay Naruto…" Kurenai started to say when she turned around to see Naruto bowing low at the waist.

"Sorry, sensei! I didn't mean to peek." Naruto said quickly. He stayed in that position waiting for Kurenai's wrath.

Kurenai just looked at her student for a second and tried to make sense. Just about every encounter she could remember of someone peeping on her not once did anyone apologize. She was absolutely sure that just about every male was a pervert at some point, and she loathed them for it; But here was her student who happened to possibly see up her dress and he was saying he was sorry for it.

Kurenai chuckled at the situation. She knew that her dress might cause problems but it was how she fought. Most opponents focused on her dress more than what she was doing giving her time to make a kill. While this gave her an advantage in combat outside of it, it did nothing but cause problems for her. She honestly thought about changing her outfit at times, but you never know when you could come under attack so she never did.

Kurenai looked at Naruto and sighed, "Look Naruto, I'm not going to punish you because in truth it was both of our faults. Mine was for wearing the dress. I know it causes some trouble, but you shouldn't have stared…" Kurenai said while watching Naruto's face make a really good tomato impression.

Kurenai then decided to try an evil idea, "So did you like what you saw?" Kurenai said with an evil smirk on her face._ 'I've spent too much time with Anko…' _Kurenai thought.

'_Oh Kami, she's just like Anko!'_ Naruto thought, not answering only staring wide eyed at her.

Kurenai saw his eyes widen then she started to walk back to the group walking just past him so she could whisper in his ear, "Well I hope you did, just ask next time instead of peeping." Kurenai whispered and then walked off, leaving a red faced Naruto.

Naruto was, to say the least, stunned beyond belief. His brain had shut down for a second time in the past hour, and this time it took longer to reboot and for him to run back to his team, still red faced.

*** One mile away from estate ***

As the team neared the estate, they moved closer to the road. They couldn't very well jump over the estate's wall without causing problems. As they neared the entrance they noticed a small crowd of 15 gathered on the road.

Kurenai motioned for them all to stop and move silently closer. Hinata jumped over to Kurenai and whispered, "Sensei, they don't like normal guards."

"I know, let's find out who they are. For all we know the client hired more guards because he doesn't believe in our skill. Wouldn't be the first time that's happened." Kurenai whispered back.

The team moved as quietly as possible toward the group to ascertain their identity, and figure out why they were there.

"Ugh, why do we have to sit on this stupid road? If Haniko is so strong, why don't we just hit the bastard now?" One of the bandits asked, obviously annoyed with being stuck on the road.

"Hey you wanna take her on? I'd just do what she said, and we can all walk away a little richer. Of course this is also hoping she doesn't stick those other nin on us because she doesn't want to pay us anymore." Another one answered him.

Kurenai had heard enough and motioned for her team to fall back. When they were far enough away to talk safely she quickly addressed them, "Okay, so here is the plan. We are going to take this group out now, so they won't be a bother later. Hinata, you're with me, Shino you are going to stay on this side on the road, and Naruto get on the other. Get into position so you can take them down without using jutsu. As far as we know they are being watched and we don't want to give away anything or be down on chakra. Naruto when you get into position I want to you take out the lead man. We'll then launch our attack."

All three nodded and quickly moved to position. Naruto casted a quick genjutsu on himself so he couldn't be seen and raced across the road and quickly deactivated the jutsu and jumped into the trees. Shino moved so he had a clear line of sight on the group and readied six kunai.

Kurenai and Hinata were just a little ways away from Shino, each having six shuriken out and ready to jump on Kurenai's signal. She was waiting now on Naruto.

Naruto after getting into position readied his senbon. He quickly pulled out and extra one and threw it and the lead bandit, killing him quickly. Not one of the bandits responded until the body fell forward and then it was too late. Kunai, senbon and shuriken flew out of the wood, slaughtering most of the group of bandits. The remaining four bandits quickly tried to figure out where the attack was coming from until more senbon hit them and they fell from the deadly needles.

The team emerged from the forest and looked over the bodies. Hinata had a sad face on as she quickly gathered the used weapons. Kurenai looked for any orders or intelligence the bandits might have held on to but didn't find anything. Quickly having the team pile the bodies together, she used a small fire jutsu to burn the bodies leaving no evidence of the carnage.

"Okay, we need to move quickly. If they've started to guard the road then they could be making their move on the client right now." Kurenai said, receiving three nods.

The team quickly ran up the road in a loose formation.

*** Estate Gates***

As the team quickly moved toward the gate that they could now see, they slowed to a quick walk which allow them all to catch their breath. "Halt!" One of the guards yelled as they approached.

The group halted, waiting for the guards to approached them. "What business do Konoha nin have here?" One guard asked eyeing each of them carefully.

Kurenai stepped forward holding out a scroll, "We've been sent by the Hokage, at the request of Junichiro Nakasone."

The guard quickly took the scroll and quickly skimmed it only to nod in the end handing the scroll back to Kurenai. "Let me summon the Captain, he'll escort you." Kurenai nodded stepped back to stand with her squad.

Five minutes later the Captain showed up, and asked to see the scroll to confirm for himself. "Umm, not to be rude of anything, but it says here that we were to receive two shinobi squads. Mind me asking where the other is?" The captain asked.

"They were to arrive today back at Konoha, so we were sent ahead to ascertain the situation and figure out a best course of action. They should arrive tomorrow, and then we can deal with your problems." Kurenai answered. The three genin just watched the interaction, learning how to deal with clients since they were still rather new.

"Well, I'm sure Junichiro-sama would like to speak with you before anything happens. If you would all follow me please." With that the Captain began walking over to the main building in the estate.

As they walked through the estate Naruto looked around, _'How the hell, is this just an estate? It looks more like a freaking palace!'_ Naruto thought as him and his team walked along a stone pathway, lined with flower beds with a stream running alongside them.

'_**Well I bet it's called an estate by the noble who lives here mainly because of how high up on the food chain he could be. So this is probably just his get-a-way house.'**_ Kurama said.

Naruto was floored that this could be a second house. The house itself was lined with green tiles, with jade pillars at regular intervals along the wooden walkway that wrapped around the house itself. The roof looked to be made of a darker jade tile.

The captain lead the team around the house, still walking on the stone steps, they came to the back of the house, where the door was opened.

Junichiro Nakasone was a rather tall man, though he seemed to be built like a toothpick. He had short brown hair that seemed to be combed back with dark hazel eyes. _'If I didn't know any better, I would have thought he was just a normal man who happened to be tall.'_ Naruto thought. Little did he know, that the others were thinking the same thing.

As they approached, the man seemed to seize them up as if trying to guess their worth. Kurenai quickly stepped forward and bowed slightly, "Junichiro-sama, we are shinobi sent from Konoha at your request from our Hokage." Kurenai said.

Nakasone, nodded his head in acknowledgment, "I was expecting more than just three children and yourself." Nakasone said.

"While we do have another team on the way and they will arrive tomorrow, I would like to point out that these 'children' as you put it are highly trained shinobi." Kurenai said, trying with everything she had not to walk up to the man and deck him insulting her team.

"I will have to take your word for it. May I ask though, why I should trust such young shinobi with my welfare?" Nakasone asked, with a blank look on his face.

"I would tell you to trust them with your welfare because I trust them with mine, but that probably wouldn't mean as much to you as it would a shinobi. I would say though, that we were personally picked for this mission because of our skill set. I would ask that you put your trust in the Hokage's judgment then if you will not take my word for it." Kurenai said, with thinly veiled annoyance behind her last words.

Naruto stood there watching the slight confrontation watching the man for any subtle hints as to what the man was after. He noticed that slight hit of a smile, as if he was testing Kurenai and seeing as she was getting annoyed he was getting the reaction he wanted. _'The bastard is just toying with us… He's finding it amusing to look down on us and Kurenai is just feeding him what he wants.'_ Naruto finally pieced together.

'_**I'd have to say your probably right. If this guy wouldn't trust the Hokage, then he must have a slight inferiority complex and thinks he's above everyone here.'**_ Kurama surmised along with Naruto.

Naruto quickly decided to speak out of turn, "Umm, Kurenai-sensei, Junichiro-sama. If I may, I'd like to suggest that we quickly move on to the matter at hand about the bandits." Naruto said, in a rather quiet tone. Naruto looked at the noble to see a slight frown on his face at seeing that he would have to move off the current topic.

"Ah, yes I am sorry for taking up much of your time. I just worry about my welfare is all. Now I trust that you have been informed about the situation?" the man said, trying to give off an air of superiority.

"Hai, we have; But I'd like to get a few more specifics out of the way if I may. We happen to encounter a group of 15 bandits just down the road. Before we eliminated them they began to talk about a few missing nin. Now I'm aware that in your request you asked for a team of an ever growing bandit population that has taken up resident nearby. I'd like to ask if you knew of the missing nin and just chose not to inform us or if you truly didn't know." Kurenai asked. She knew it really didn't matter mission wise, since the Hokage was sending two teams. It did however matter on the pay, and she'll be damned if her team was being taken advantage of.

"I was not, although I had suspected that someone smarter was leading the group. I did not know of the missing nin, until you had confirmed my theory. As such I will send along some more payment to cover the rest of the cost." The noble said, waving the issue off like it was nothing.

Kurenai bristled at this action. Sure he may not have known, but he could have told the Hokage his "theory" instead of choosing to keep that information secret from them until it was too late. "Okay, then I'd also like to know of any encounters your guards have had with the group, and what you estimate their numbers are at now." Kurenai said.

Nakasone just turned his head to the captain and nodded. The captain sighed, "We estimate their numbers to be roughly 40 men. As for the encounters just light skirmishes, no casualties on either side but a few wounded."

Kurenai nodded at this information, "Alright, me and my team will set up a perimeter then. We'll be waiting for tomorrow to devise any offensive assaults. Until Team 10 shows up we're just going to be on the defensive. I'd rather not send my team alone to take out these men." Kurenai said.

Kurenai went to turn around to give orders to the three genin when she was quickly interrupted. "Umm, if I may. Why would you need to form a perimeter when my guards have the walls?" Nakasone asked.

Kurenai turned to the man and was about to respond when Naruto beat her to the punch, "We need to set a perimeter BECAUSE of the walls. They are visible to the enemy where our perimeter will not be. The walls, while they may make you feel safe, are actually a disadvantage when defending here. The walls are a visible defense which is good to have, but works best when you have a primary line of defense that isn't shown." Naruto stated, with a blank expression.

Everyone there turned to stare at the blonde as if he had grown a second head. _'Is it really so surprising that I would know that?'_ Naruto thought.

'_**Well to them I guess it is. Though if you didn't know why, I'd bring you in here and kick your ass.'**_ Kurama replied.

'_Just go take a nap or something, there's nothing for you to do now anyway Ero-kitsune.' _Naruto thought back.

'_**What? Are you still upset for what I said? Come on, it wasn't that bad. Besides weren't you the one staring at her thigh earlier? And you call me a perv…'**_ Kurama said, quickly cutting the link off to stop his retort.

"Excellently put Naruto. Now Hinata, I want you to stay in the compound scanning the surrounding area. Me and Naruto will leave shadow clones with you. Warn us if someone is coming and they will dispel. Shino and Naruto, you two will start placing traps at random intervals about a quarter of a mile away from the wall. Start from the South going North on the Eastern side. I'll be setting up traps on the west side." Kurenai ordered.

"Also, just in case either one of us is attacked Hinata you are to wait for the others to move to help. I do not want you charging into a battlefield alone. Naruto and Shino if you come under attack, I want to you fight as best as you can and if you aren't able to win then stall. Be safe and swift.

All three genin nodded, and both Naruto and Kurenai quickly made shadow clones, leaving them with Hinata as they got to work.

*** With Kurenai ***

After three hours of work, Kurenai was almost done with her side. Her shadow clone was still with Hinata so all was good. To be honest all was going better then Kurenai thought would happen. She had assumed that the bandits would have known about the group they killed earlier by now and would have sent a force to see what they were now up against.

Since that hadn't happened Kurenai was left with her thoughts, though she was trying very hard to focus on setting the traps. Unfortunately her mind kept wandering to subjects the either made her mad and/or curious of her own actions.

'_God, why is it that every man I go to do a mission for has to look down on me or my team. Like they ultimately assume I'm weak because I'm a woman. Kami damnit! Why! Like it's my fault I was born a woman and yet I'm still forced to be badgered because of it. And how could I let that ass get to me?! I knew before I walked through the gates that he wasn't going to see me in any different than those before him. Maybe I'm just frustrated after having to deal with them for so long. I'm going to request an escort mission next time. Hopefully I'll get lucky and we'll get a simple caravan escort.' _Kurenai thought, as she rigged up another explosive trap.

Kurenai finished making the trap, and moved on. _'I wander how everyone else deals with it. I know Anko just grins and bears with it, though she has been more violent with men since then. She normally sends guys to the hospital if they mess with her. Then Yugao… Hmm she's all about slicing people up, I bet that's because Hayate's fault. Him trying to be all pure and noble and not going to have sex until after their married. I'm not sure if he's even a guy because of that. Hmm, a lot of my friends are crazier then I thought. Then again I'm not all that great either. A guy ogles me and I use a genjutsu on him, or a find a pervert and I'm just like Anko and beat the crap out of him.' _Kurenai thought, as she dropped down and began setting another trap.

'_Now that I think about it, I blame Kakashi for this. If it wasn't for his constantly reading that smut out in the open I probably wouldn't have thrashed him for it and been known as one of Konoha's prudes. Ugh to this day it still haunts me how I lost control over that. The only guy who has ever been able to look at me, now that I think about it, in any provocative manner has been Naruto… WHAT THE HELL! WHY DID I ALLOW A 13 YEAR OLD BOY TO GET AWAY WITH IT!'_ Kurenai thought, her anger rising. Then she started on a whole new line of thinking after that thought.

'_Oh kami, how much did he see? What if he starts talking about it with Shino, or anyone else? Well it would get me off the prude list, but to be honest it's not bad there. Most guys don't bother me, but if he starts talking about me then I'm so screwed!'_ Kurenai thought worriedly, but for some reason she wasn't as worried as she thought she should be.

As she began to ponder that, she received a sudden rush of memories…

*** With Hinata***

Hinata had been sitting in a meditative pose out front of the main house, with the shadow clones that Naruto and Kurenai had left with her. She for her part had her Byakugan activated and was constantly searching a half mile around the estate.

The captain was standing close by, wondering why three of the shinobi they hired were sitting on the grass and not following the plan he had heard. The captain for his part was just a simple samurai, he didn't know too much of the shinobi world and truthfully he didn't want to know.

"Umm, excuse me I was just wondering when you were going to set up that perimeter of yours, and I was also wondering…." That was all the captain could say when he rounded to look at Hinata seeing as she was the only one who turned to acknowledge he was there. The shadow closes were busy playing a card game.

What the man saw was a little girl who's pale eyes had veins bulging out from around her eyes. Hinata looked at him but quickly looked away only to see him take a small step back. Kurenai's shadow clone saw this and knew what was coming, "Hinata, why don't you take a small break? Go ahead and deactivate your Byakugan for five minutes." The clone said.

Hinata nodded before deactivating her dojutsu, and laying back, closing her eyes, and breathing a sigh of relief. "Umm, what was that?" the captain asked.

Hinata without looking at him answered, "I'm from the Hyuga clan." Thinking that would be enough since her clan was known about in all of the elemental nations.

The captain had indeed heard of the Hyuga clan but only that they were a large well respected clan, he had no idea what that had to do with her eyes. Hinata and since opened her eyes after a brief moment, saw this and quickly explained, "The Hyuga clan has a Kekkei Genkai, or a bloodline trait, known as the Byakugan. It's a dojutsu which resides in the eyes and allows us a certain perception that not everyone can see. It has been called the "All-Seeing Eye" by many people."

He finally understood, "And I'm going to assume that you can see over great distances then?" He asked her.

"Yes, my father has been known to be able to see over several miles, though he has mastered it and I have not I'm still able to see over a great distance in all directions." Hinata stated. It was then that Hinata realized something, she wasn't stuttering anymore.

'_Yes! It's finally gone! Finally!'_ Hinata thought, jumping up and down for joy in her head.

Naruto's clone looked over at her quickly, "Hinata don't forget to keep watching." The clone said with a smile on his face.

"H-H-Hai, N-Naruto." Hinata said.

'_Damnit!'_ Hinata yelled in her thoughts, _'I'm going to be cursed to stutter in front of Naruto forever aren't I?'_

Giving a sigh, Hinata quickly activated her Byakugan and decided to focus on her work instead of the depressing thought that she'll never be able to talk with Naruto without stuttering. As she scanned the area around her, she quickly went rigid.

Both clones noticed this and moved quickly to her side, "Who is it Hinata?" Kurenai's clone asked.

"Naruto and Shino are being attacked sensei, they're under attack by what appear to be 15 bandits, and three others who have bigger chakra signatures." Hinata said with worry lacing itself into her words.

Kurenai's clone just nodded before quickly dispelling, however Naruto's did not. "I'll go with you and Kurenai-sensei, I don't want the boss to be distracted right now with any memories I might send back to him." The clone stated, only to receive a small nod from Hinata as she stayed focused on the battle waiting for Kurenai to show up so she could lend support.

***Naruto and Shino***

The two boys were taking turns setting up the traps as they tried to move as swiftly as they could up the line, thought they weren't moving as fast as Kurenai because they didn't have the same experience as she did. None the less they were making rather good time.

Both boys seemed to be content with staying quiet, while one of them set up a trap and the other stayed on look out. Though the silence wouldn't last for long.

"Naruto, would you mind if I ask you a couple of questions that have been bothering me?" Shino asked.

Naruto, who at the time was setting up a trip wire, was stunned for a second, "Umm, sure fire away Shino."

"Naruto, what did Kurenai-sensei want to talk to you about before we got here?" Shino asked. He was still wondering if his teammate was hiding something from the rest of them.

"Oh that? Kurenai-sensei just wanted to know in more detail about what all Anko-sen… Anko taught me." Naruto quickly lied.

Shino nodded at that, it normally wasn't given out what training they each had just their skill sets. "Okay, now I have another question, why is it that you call Kurenai-sensei sensei and not Anko?" This had been bugging Shino for some reason, Not even he knew why just that it didn't seem right.

"Would you believe me that she threatened to turn me into sashimi if I did?" Naruto said, facing paling at the memory of when he had the same talk with Anko. "She's not big on formalities, so it's now a punishment. Any time I call her sensei I have to buy the dango." Naruto said while finishing his work so they could move on.

Shino was quiet for a while and they got through three more traps before Shino continued with his questioning. "Naruto, why do you choose to use genjutsu when anyone who's been near you knows that you could easily be a ninjutsu specialist with the amount of chakra you possess?"

Naruto sighed, everyone who had seen or heard him fight ended up asking him about it. Even Shikamaru who was his best friend was like that. "For tactical reasons as well as a personal view." Naruto said.

"Would you mind clarifying that statement?" Shino asked as he was just finishing up a trap.

Naruto nodded, "It's simple really, genjutsu while not as strong as the others ninpo, it requires you to think a lot more, where most you just take action. You have to think like your enemy, and it also requires a lot of patience."

Shino nodded, "That's tactical, so what's the personal?"

"Most people who use ninjutsu, taijutsu, or kenjutsu have a tendency to develop a sort of god complex. A lot of them think it makes them great, and they are praised to heavens for it too which doesn't help. With genjutsu because it is in short just illusions, can be dispelled at any time. Which makes the art a lot harder to learn correctly and pull off, but it also keeps you away from thinking your Kami reincarnated."

Shino absorbed all of this information and stayed silent for a moment, then spoke, "Thank you, I had never thought of that before. It gives an interesting view of the world that I haven't seen before."

Naruto sighed in relief that Shino seemed done with his questions as they sped off to try to finish setting up their traps. As they neared the next spot they thought to put a trap, Shino quickly turned around and pushed Naruto.

Naruto wasn't prepared for this and was forced back a step as he saw Shino jump from him as well. Naruto was confused for a second before he looked where he had just been and noticed a couple arrows sticking out of the ground.

'_Damnit, I didn't notice them because I was so focused on the work and Shino's questions.'_ Naruto thought as he quickly moved into a defensive stance, as he saw Shino try to move closer to him so they could help defend each other.

"Well shit, I was hoping sensei was right and tonight could have been a quiet night." Naruto said as he pulled out some senbon.

"I agree, but then again maybe this is better. This way we won't have to fight as many when the other team arrives." Shino said, throwing his hands up in front of him and allowing his insects to fly free and seek their newest pray.

Out of the tree line came two bandits that charged at the genin with their weapons raised. Naruto let loose his senbon killing both of them, Shino quickly spread his bugs in front of them to hopefully keep the others at bay.

"**Doton: Doro ōkami (Mud Wolves)**"

Naruto and Shino quickly jumped up as four wolves made of mud charged their location and slammed into trees. Behind those were even more wolves, Shino saw them and launched bugs at them eating away the chakra that was keeping them together.

Naruto quickly tried to identify where the jutsu can been cast from but before he could do anything he felt a hand grab and pick him up by his trench coat. Acting as quickly as he could, he slipped out of the coat and twisted to look at the man behind him. Without any hesitation he pulled a kunai he had on him and slashed at the man, cutting open his jugular.

The man was stunned for a second then grabbed at his neck as he fell backwards. Naruto looked around and saw Shino quickly launched a kunai that lodged itself in another man's chest.

Another man flipped out of the trees and landed between both boys slamming his hands on the ground and saying, "**Doton: Doro Nami(Mud Wave)**" Which threw both Naruto and Shino further away from each other.

Shino quickly picked himself off the ground and was confronted with five bandits. His insects also alerted him that there was someone up in the trees watching. He assumed since he wasn't on the ground then he was probably a missing nin and not a bandit. Remembering his sensei's words, he quickly released more bugs from his body, causing the bandits to look very weary at attacking him. "If you were smart, you'd walk away now." Shino said while adjusting his glasses.

The man in the tree's decided that, that was the time to jump down beside the bandits. "So you are part of Konoha's Aburame clan. Well I haven't had the pleasure of ever taking on someone from that blood line, I have heard they are quiet formidable." The man said.

Shino nodded at the compliment, only for the man to continue. "The Aburame clan are known mainly for their work with chakra eating insects that they form a pact with at birth allowing them to create a hive inside the body. However from what I've heard about all of the Aburame clan is that you all are long-ranged fighters," The man said with a sneer, "Get close to him, don't worry about the bugs at all, they can't kill you if you don't have chakra." The man lied at the end.

Shino said nothing but knew that this wasn't going to be easy, he was just hoping that Naruto was faring better than him.

*** With Naruto ***

Naruto was forced to dodge another attack that had come at him, while trying to keep an eye on the missing nin that was playing around above him sending shuriken down on him every so often.

Naruto when he was separated from Shino found himself faced with six bandits and a missing nin, the bandits had since kept the presser up on him and with him being a long-range fighter he was trying to do his best. He was as little irritated that he didn't have his trench coat with him since most of his weapons were sealed in it.

The group had quickly figured out that he used genjutsu, which was broken by the missing nin when it was casted, so he's only been able to dodge and not get any distance away from him.

This was both to his benefit that they were still attacking him and also to his disadvantage. They kept attacking him too quickly for him to pull off any ninjutsu, and yet so long as they kept attacking him it gave Kurenai and Hinata time to quickly come help him and Shino.

As his mind quickly began to wonder, how Shino was fairing since he wasn't as good in close combat as Naruto, he received another slash across his torso. Naruto quickly cursed and jumped far back, only to get shuriken thrown at him.

'_God this is irritating, I can't get anything in. I'm out of weapons, no time to use jutsu… Hey Ero-kitsune, you have any ideas?'_ Naruto thought.

'_**Unfortunately I think you are just going to have to take a hit from the missing nin, so you can cast a jutsu otherwise this fight isn't going to end well at all'**_Kurama thought back.

Naruto thought for a quick second as he continued to dodge attacks and realized that was going to be his only option.

So Naruto jumped backwards only to have the shuriken thrown at him again, but this time he just stood and ran through hand signs. The shuriken hit him and his hands faltered as he slammed against a tree behind him. Naruto quickly ripped out a shuriken off his forearm and through it at the bandit group and quickly ran through different hand signs than before. "**Shuriken Kage Bunshin no Jutsu(Shuriken Shadow Clone)**" The one shuriken turned into 30.

The shuriken pelted into the group, unfortunately killing only 3 of the bandits while the other three rushed at Naruto. Quickly making hand signs again this time have all the time he needed, "**Katon: Dangan o nenshō(Burning bullet)**!"

Naruto shot out three flaming bullets out of his mouth only to have them impact themselves into the faces of the bandits effectively killing them. Naruto's breathing was getting heavier but that was normal. After all he had been continuously been dodging and have pulled off two jutsu in quick succession, one of which he put more chakra into then he needed.

As Naruto pulled a few more shuriken out of his arms and the two that had gotten past them and punctured into his torso, the missing nin walked up as if everything Naruto had just done hadn't fazed him in the least.

"So, ready to take me on now or are you going to run back and hide behind more cronies?" Naruto quipped at the missing nin, hoping to anger him into making a stupid mistake.

The man however wasn't that easy to manipulate, "Oh, but fighting you would be so much fun. Even if my orders are just to see what your abilities are, I think I'll have a little fun with you first." He said only to start moving toward Naruto with a kunai drawn.

Naruto saw the kunai and bent backwards as it was meant to stab him. Moving his left hand backward to brace himself he threw his right foot up to kick the man across the face, which surprised him and he jumped back.

Naruto quickly straightened looking at his opponent, he had broken or at least bloodied the man's nose. He went to try and put distance between the two only for him to charge again. Naruto stood his ground once more before a kunai embedded itself in the man's head.

Naruto was confused only for a second before Kurenai was in front of him. At the sight of his sensei Naruto sighed in relief only to feel the damage that had been done to his body and fall on his ass.

"Naruto are you alright?" Kurenai asked quickly checking him over for any serious wounds and found the decent sized slash across his chest.

"Just tired, running here then setting up traps and now a fight. How is Shino doing?" Naruto asked as he removed his shirt for Kurenai to bandage him, which she proceeded to do quickly.

"He's fine, he had finished off all but one of his attackers before we arrived, and Hinata quickly helped him to overwhelm him. I found another missing nin who seemed to just be observing both fights and killed him quickly and then made a bee-line to you." Kurenai explained as she wrapped the bandage around his torso to stanch the bleeding.

Naruto began to feel the blood loss, before he remembered something he was carrying. Pulling out a pill he quickly swallowed it. It was a plasma pill, designed to help him replace the blood that he lost during the fight.

As Kurenai quickly finished she handed him his trench coat and helped him to walk toward Shino and Hinata. Shino for the most part seemed unharmed except a few cuts on his huge jacket.

"Okay, let's get these two back to the estate, they need to heal and rest so me and Hinata will be on guard duty. Naruto when you feel well enough I'd like you to make a few teams of shadow clones and have them run the perimeter so we're not caught unaware." Naruto nodded to his sensei's orders. The two Kunoichi helped Naruto and Shino back.


End file.
